The literary history of Spanish America

THE LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH
AMERICA

V

•Thj^)^^

^ THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

,^J^' NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO • DALLAS
^'•' ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd.

' TORONTO

THE /^a^-^'rJ"

• LITERARY HISTORY OF
SPANISH AMERICA ^

^'tM.^-daxc-^jpgjt suj

BY

ALFRED COESTER, Ph.D.

COR. MEMBER HISPANIC SOCIETY OF AMERICA n'lL.^li^

Nfm fork

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

1919

AU rights reserved

HiSTORV i

COPVKIGMT, 1916,

By the MACMILLAN COMPANY.

Set up and electrotyped. Published August, 19x6.

VntfDooH linsf :

Berwick & Smith Co., Norwood, Mau., U.SJL

rO,

».- LP

TO

BELLE HAVEN

MY WIFE

AS A TOKEN IN REMEMBRANCE OF
OUR COMMON STUDY OF THE SPAN-
ISH LANGUAGE.

420330

PREFACE

Latin America and the United States resemble two
neighbors who have long lived side by side, each too busy
with private matters to take more than an indifferent if
not hostile interest in the other. Recently we North
Americans have been taking a broader interest in our
neighbors. The building of the Panama Canal has di-
rected our attention to the south. We have discovered
that those vast unknown regions are inhabited by human
beings worthy of being better known though their char-
acter differ widely from our own.

So great is our lack of acquaintance with our southern
neighbors that few can say with ex-President Taft: —
"I know the attractiveness of the Spanish American; I
know his highborn courtesy; I know his love of art, his
poet nature, his response to generous treatment, and I
know how easily he misunderstands the thoughtless
bluntness of an Anglo-Saxon diplomacy, and the too fre-
quent lack of regard for the feelings of others that we have
inherited." {The Independent, Dec. i8, 1913.)

What ex-President Taft thus writes from personal
experience, it is possible for others to learn by reading the
books written by Spanish Americans. The main char-
acteristics and trend of the Spanish-American mind are
revealed in his literature.

But shall we call Spanish-American writings literature?
A professor in Argentina wished a few years ago to estab-

viii PREFACE

lish a course for students in Spanish-American literature.
The plan was opposed by Bartolome Mitre, ex-President
of the republic and himself a poet and historian of the first
rank, on the ground that such a thing did not exist. He
held the view that mere numbers of books did not form a
literature; though united by the bond of a common
language, the printed productions of Spanish Americans
had no logical union nor gave evidence of an evolution
toward a definite goal. On the other hand, he admitted
that their "literary productions might be considered, not
as models but as facts, classified as the expression of their
social life during three periods, the colonial epoch, the
struggle for freedom, and the independent existence of the
several republics."

Such is the general plan adopted for this book. The
conditions of life during the colonial period and the com-
mon aim of the different countries during the revolutionary
epoch gave a certain similarity to their literary produc-
tions. Freedom won, however, each country pursued its
own course in literature as in politics.

These two are interdependent. Literature is often
meaningless without an understanding of contemporary
politics. Everywhere the literary expression of politics is
found in journalism. In Spanish America it is found also
in verse and fiction. So the broad lines of politics have
been taken in this book as a guide through the maze of
print.

The judgment which one renders on the value of Spanish-
American literature depends entirely on the point of view
with which the critic approaches its study. If he considers
it a branch or sub-order of Spanish literature, he will reach

PREFACE ix

conclusions similar to those of the late Marcelino Menen-
dezy Pelayo in his Historiade la Poesia Hispano-americana.
To him as a Spaniard the exuberance of American pa-
triotic verse is not only detestable but bad literature. To
his mind only those productions have worth which ap-
proximate the standard set by Spanish classics.

Another critic has observed the frank imitadon of
French models. It is true that Spanish-American writers
in their eagerness to reject Spain have taken France
as the intellectual leader of their Latin America. The
term Latin-American republics which they prefer has the
justification of permitting the inclusion of Portuguese-
speaking Brazil and an easy absorption of the numerous
Italian element of Argentina. Moreover, it makes possible
a claim of kinship with admired France. But a critic who
attempts to set forth the literature of Latin America
wholly on the basis of its relation to French literature will
miss both its significance and its originality.

Both spring from the history and language of the Latin-
American republics. The language of Spanish America is
not only permeated with terms and expressions taken from
its daily life but also differs in pronunciation and structure
from the Castilian even more than the English of North
America from the educated speech of England. As to the
originality of Spanish-American literature it lies chiefly in
the subject-matter, in its pictures of natural scenery and
social life.

From the moment of their discovery of America the
Spaniards were amazed at the great rivers, the lofty
Andes mountains, the luxuriance of tropical vegetation.
And when they expressed their amazement in literary

X PREFACE

form, Virgil was their model. To the participants in the
conquest of the new world their enterprise resembled the
deeds of knight errantry related by Ariosto. So in imita-
tion of his art they often wrote down the story of their
exploits in poems in which truth sometimes paid tribute to
form. In the nineteenth century, when the reconstruction
of the past became the popular literary fashion under the
influence of romanticism, the legends of the colonial period
supplied the poet with ample material. Later, when
naturalistic fiction came into vogue, ambitious followers of
Zola in Spanish America found ready at hand a novel
type of society to portray. Thus the form of Latin-
American literature has been imitative while the matter
is original.

For an English-speaking American then who desires a
better acquaintance with the mentality of his Spanish-
American neighbors this book will offer a guide. The
literature of Brazil written in Portuguese and so rich as to
require a volume almost as large as the present for its
adequate exposition, is therefore not included. The reader,
aware at the outset that he has before him an extremely
provincial type of literature, will not expect great master-
pieces. On the other hand, he will learn what effect has
been produced on the transplanted Spaniard by living on
the great plains of Argentina. He will better comprehend
the difference between the sober energetic Chilean and the
fun-loving Peruvian or the passionate Venezuelan. He
will understand why there have been so many revolutions
in Mexico. The anecdotes of poets* lives and the tragic
stories of men who have lived and died for an ideal will
inspire him with greater respect for a country which like

PREFACE xi

Cuba struggled a whole century for its freedom. Even the
names of the various writers, the constantly recurring
Jose Maria, Joaquin, Manuel, will impress him with the
deeply religious sentiments of these peoples.

The difficulty of preparing this book has been great.
Only two really valuable collections of works by Spanish-
American authors exist in this country, one in the library
of the Hispanic Society of America, the other in the library
of Harvard University. Both are far from being complete,
but fortunately they supplement each other. Histories of
the literatures of the several countries have been written
by natives only of Argentina, Venezuela and Uruguay, and
these are defective in many ways. The dates of the births
and deaths of the writers, for example, are not always
given. Spanish Americans in treating the literatures of
their own countries usually include a consideration of
historical writings, but the limits of this book allow only a
casual mention of the most important works of purely
historical or scientific content. Periodicals, on the other
hand, have demanded attention because, as the means of
immediate publicity for literary endeavor, they have often
played a considerable role in literary history and now sup-
ply the investigator with much material.

On account of the character of his sources of informa-
tion, not always reliable, the author of the present volume
may have wrongly estimated the work of any given writer
or even omitted mention of some whom a compatriot may
deem important. Any grievous errors either of judgment
or of omission should therefore be condoned.

The author wishes here to thank for their kind assistance
in various ways Sefior Paul Groussac, the learned librarian

xii PREFACE

of the national library at Buenos Aires, Seiior Carlos de
Velasco, editor of the excellent review Cuba Contempo-
raneay Seiior Pedro Henriquez Urefia, critic and formerly
professor at the University of Mexico, Senor Max Hen-
riquez Urefia, poet and essayist, Doctor Gonzalo Picon
Febres, novelist and advocate of Americanism in litera-
ture, the late Dr. W. R. Martin, librarian of the Hispanic
Society of America, and Professor E. C. Hills. To J. D. M.
Ford, Smith professor of literature in Harvard University,
the author is indebted for the suggestion, which led to the
writing of this book.

ALFRED COESTER.
New York, 191 6.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

I. The Colonial Period i

II. The Revolutionary Period 39.

III. The Revolutionary Period in North America . . 79

IV. Argentina .^ 104

V. Uruguay 169

VI. Chile 196

VII. Peru and Bolivia 244

VIII. Ecuador 264

IX. Colombia 273

X. Venezuela 305

XL Mexico 334

XII. Cuba 373

XIII. Santo Domingo, Puerto Rico, Central America 431

XIV. The Modernista Movement 450

Bibliography 477

Index of Names 483

THE LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH
AMERICA

LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH
AMERICA

CHAPTER I

THE COLONIAL PERIOD

Spanish enterprise on the American continent had for
its participants the nature of a conquest. Trained on the
battle fields of Italy under leaders who had assisted Fer-
dinand of Aragon to expel from Spanish soil the last of the
Moorish invaders, they carried across the Atlantic the
ideals of the successful soldier. A mere handful of them so
well protected by steel armor against the weapons of the
natives and so able to inspire terror in their opponents by
means of their horses and the flash and roar of their mus-
ketry was enough to win an empire. When a common
Spanish soldier could rise to the possession of immense
wealth and hold sway over millions of human beings, a
new world had certainly been discovered. To Spaniards
no other name was so fitting for this continent as that by
which it was constantly called, "el Nuevo Mundo," The
New Worid.

They were not actuated, however, merely by the lure of
gold. A religious fanaticism carried them like crusaders
into unknown dangers. Wherever they went their first
care was to plant the cross. So early as Columbus' second
voyage thirteen monks sailed with him for the purpose of

''^'' ' '' 'LitERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

converting the natives to Christianity. Thus the monastic
establishment became an integral part of every consider-
able Spanish settlement. To the honor of the monks and
priests be it said that, having the natives as their especial
care, they made heroic efforts to protect the poor wretches
from the rapacity of the seekers after gold.

Columbus selected for permanent settlement on account
of its gold mines the island which he named Hispaniola,
now called Santo Domingo or Haiti. For many years it
received a considerable immigration of men of substance
coming to America with their families, though many later
proceeded farther west. After the discovery of the main-
land the two most important centers of Spanish civiliza-
tion in America became Mexico City and Lima, La Ciudad
de los Reyes, as it was named by its founder Francisco
Pizarro, the conquistador of Peru. ^

The Aztec city of Tenochtitlah, developed and extended
under the more pronounceable name of Mexico, was estab-
lished by Heman Cortes as the capital of Nueva Espaiia.
The name Mexico for the whole country was not adopted
till after the separation from Spain. New Spain or Mexico
on account of its geographical situation, its climate, its
greater proximity to the mother country possessed during
the golden period of Spanish literature a high degree of
^culture. From those bibliographical manuals in rhyme,
Cervantes' Fiaje de Parnaso and Lope de Vega's Laurel
de A polo, written respectively in 1614 and 1630, one may
learn how numerous were the versifiers and the dramatists
who practiced the poetic art on both sides of the Atlantic.

Peru also received a full contingent of men of letters, but
on account of its greater wealth in gold and silver there

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 3

were attracted thither more purely adventurous spirits.
Among them were men of the highest Spanish nobility.
And a transfer in a governmental position from Mexico
to Peru was apparently regarded as a promotion.

The government of the Spanish dominions in America
was entrusted to viceroys assisted by a court or audiencia
composed of several judges. At first Nueva Espaiia and
Peru were the only viceroyalties, for outlying regions were
administered by a member of the audiencia. It is needless
to say that the holders of such responsible positions were
men of education and culture. For their own entertain-
ment the viceroys, if not always poets themselves as was
sometimes the case, encouraged at their courts the produc-
tion of literature.

Even the first explorers were often men of literary
y^ attainments. The letters of Columbus and the reports of
Cortes to their monarchs are well known. Similar cartas
(kjrelacion were returned to Spain from almost every ex-
pedition, so that few_events in history have been more
fully covered by a written record than the Spanish con-
quest of America. These accounts of exploration and
adventure have value not only as historical documents of
prime importance but as literary productions. With due
allowance for differences in style and point of view one
may say that their writers had as keen an appreciation of
sensational effect as any modem war correspondent.

Close at the heels of the men at arms came friars who

made it their business to gather at first hand materials for

their writings. The most famous of these is Fray Bar-

^tolome de las Casas whose Historia de las Indias was

written especially for the purpose of voicing an indignant

4 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

protest against the treatment of the Indians at the hands
of his fellow countrymen. Other historical compilations,
like the narratives of the conquistadores, are so numerous
that a consideration of them is beyond the limits of this
book. They cover practically every phase of Spanish
settlement.

Another class of writers, some of whom were members of
religious orders, consisted of men born in America who
wrote with enthusiasm for love of their native soil. Special
interest attaches to those who had in their veins blood of
the conquered races. Having learned from their mothers
the native language and moods, they were able to pen-
etrate beneath the surface of the aboriginal mind and

^ traditions. In Peru the IacaJaarcilas?9--deJ^JVega (1540-
1616) owed his title to his ancestry, his mother being of
the blood royal, granddaughter of Tupac Yupanqui and
niece of Huayna Capac, and his celebrity to his Comen-
tarios re ales, published as written in two parts in 1609 and
1 61 6. As history the book is not absolutely reliable, but
as entertaining literature it is unsurpassed by any other
of the histories of Peru. Moreover, it presents within cer-
tain limits the native point of view of the conquest, with
many details of history and manners which only a person
with such an ancestry could give.

A somewhat similar position in the history of Mexico

X^ was held by Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl, a lineal de-
scendant of the royal line of Tezcuco, who was employed
by the viceroy as an interpreter. The results of his re-
searches in native history, made early in the seventeenth
century, were contained in various volumes of which the
most important was entitled Historia Chichimeca. The

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 5

subject of aboriginal writers in Mexico alone requires
however several books for its complete exposition.

Education and culture in America were fostered by two
actions of the Spanish authorities, the establishment of
universities and the introduction of the printing press,
both the care of the clergy. The first book printed in
America was the Breve y Compendiosa Doctrina Christiana ^
en lengua mexicana y castellana, 1539, by Fray Juan de
Zumarraga, first bishop of Mexico. By a strange coin-
cidence the first universities in America were both au-
thorized by Charles the Fifth in the same year, 1551, to
be established in Mexico and Lima.

The printing of a book in the Spanish colonies was not a
matter to be lightly undertaken, for it was a costly opera-
tion. It was therefore enjoyed only by authors with
money or wealthy patrons. For that reason many a poem
of the early period has remained in manuscript. Recent
interest in colonial history has brought to light some of
these manuscripts. Doubtless many more still lie for-
gotten in the dust of some library of Europe or America.
One curious result of the expense attending the manufac-
ture of a book is the fact that some of the best executed
works, printed on the finest paper, and handsomely bound,
are the most worthless from the point of view of literature.
They contain the verses of occasion produced and recited
at the exercises held to commemorate the death of a mon- •

m

arch, the birth of a prince, or the induction into his office
of some viceroy. Concerning the history of the printing
in Spanish America certain bibliographers have performed
a notable service, and recorded every printed work.
The sixteenth century was preeminently a period when

/

6 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

the love of adventure possessed the souls of men, and the
literary expression of that spirit in its most artistic form
is the Orlando furioso of Ariosto. In its complete form
the poem was published in 1532, one year before the au-
thor's death. By the middle of the century not only
did metrical translations begin to appear in Spain but
original heroic poems in the same metrical form became
the fashion. Acknowledged by every critic to be the most
successful of these epical compositions was Alonso de
Ercilla y Zuiiiga's poem, La Araucana, based on per-
sonal adventures in Chile. This was the first work of real
literary merit composed in America.

In our review of literature during the colonial period
of Spanish America it is necessary to omit consideration
of purely historical records. Yet histories of course make
up the bulk of what was written about America and in
America at this time. And even when the writer thought
to embellish his story by putting it in metrical form, its
value lies more in the historical facts than in its literary
qualities. But the Araucana stands apart from the other
poems of the same type both in its intrinsic worth and in
its influence on Spanish-American literature even during
the nineteenth century. Regarding it the Spanish literary
historian Ferrer del Rio says, "It would be difficult to
find a livelier impression of the Spanish sixteenth cen-
tury, the great passions of Charles V and Phillip II, war,
daring navigation, distant conquests, a love for the un-
known and for adventures, religious sentiment and vener-
ation for the sacred objects of worship."

Alonso de Ercilla y Zufiiga (1533-94) was born in the
same year that Ariosto died. The translations of the

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 7

Orlando furioso became popular in Spain just before
Ercilla set out for America. In fact Ercilla referred to
Ariosto as one of his models; the imitation, however, was
more general than particular, for Ercilla's episodes were
chiefly historical facts, rather than poetical inventions.
At the outset of his poem he announces that he does not
intend to sing of ladies, love and chivalrous deeds which
is quite contrary to Aristo who makes them the argument
of his poem. Moreover, Ercilla in dedicating his work to
Phillip II assured his monarch that it was a true relation;
and to give weight to this assertion stated that the book
was written in part during the war in Chile "often on
leather for lack of paper and on bits of paper sometimes
so small that they contained not more than six lines."

Of highborn parentage Ercilla was attached at the age
of fifteen to the suite of the prince Phillip and accompanied
him in 1548 when he went to take possession of the duchy
of Brabant. He traveled with the prince over Europe
for the next six years and was with him in England in
1554 when Phillip married Mary Tudor. In England
Ercilla made the acquaintance of Geronimo de Alderete,
just appointed adelantado of Chile, who was to sail with
the new viceroy of Peru, Andres Hurtado de Mendoza.
Ercilla, eager for the adventures in prospect, because news
of the rebellion of the Araucanian Indians had reached
Spain, joined the expedition and arrived at Lima in 1556.
As the adelantado Alderete died on the way, the viceroy
appointed his son Don Garcia to lead the army which
should restore peace in Chile. After the war had been
in progress for some time Ercilla had an unfortunate
quarrel with a companion, Juan de Pineda. The facts

8 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

are very obscure, but for some reason Don Garcia believed
that the two men were conspiring against his authority.
He condemned them both to be beheaded and the men were
already on the scaffold before Don Garcia was persuaded
to relent and commute their punishment to imprisonment.
Not long thereafter Ercilla was released and allowed
again to take part in the war. But he cherished such
resentment against Don Garcia that he managed to leave
Chile and return to Spain in 1562. There he found favor
again with Phillip and high employment in business of
state. In 1569 he published the first part, consisting of
fifteen cantos, of his poem La Araucana. The second
part in fourteen cantos he completed in 1578 and the third
part of eight cantos in 1590.

The plan of the poem is to narrate in strictly chrono-
logical order events in Chile. The first twelve cantos
deal with the raids of the Indians on the Spanish settle-
ments and the numerous reprisals which occurred before
Ercilla's arrival. As Ercilla wished to minimize Don
Garcia de Mendoza's part in the war the heroes of the poem
are not the minor Spanish leaders whom he occasionally
mentions but the Indian chiefs. The most attractive of
these is the young Lautaro. In depicting his life Ercilla,
with a poetic defense of the role of love in human life,
probably by way of apology for changing his intention
not to sing of ladies, introduces the reader to Guacolda,
Lautaro's beautiful wife. Lautaro is surprised at night
by her side and slain. After his death the most important
of the various Araucanian caciques is Caupolican. Of
the Spaniards a certain common soldier Andrea and Er-
cilla himself play the most prominent r61es. In fact

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 9

Ercilla might be called the hero of the poem if one takes
into account the amount of space devoted to his personal
adventures.

On the other hand, the poem contains certain long di-
gressions from the main narrative. In part two by the
machinery of a personal interview of the poet with the
Goddess Bellona contemporary events in Europe, espe-
cially Phillip's victories in Flanders, are recited. Even
the naval victory of the Spaniards over the Turks at
Lepanto, though subsequent in time to the period of the
poem, is described as it was revealed to Ercilla through
the agency of a magic ball belonging to an old magician
whom he met in the mountains. In the third canto there
is a long digression about Dido. Ercilla is requested by
some soldiers to relate the true story of the famous queen
who in his opinion has been much maligned.

To the modem reader these digressions are blemishes,
but at the time of the publication of the poem they very
likely assisted in making it popular. The victories of
their king and the naval fight at Lepanto were events of
which the Spaniards were pleased to read stirring and
poetic accounts. Against the background of the distant
war in Chile they were enhanced as by perspective. The
book, immediately and immensely popular, passed through
more editions than any Spanish book of the century.
The eloquent speeches which Ercilla put into the mouths
of both Spaniards and Indians met the taste of his day.
The same may be said of the realistic details of battles
and other adventures, so realistic at times as to be grue-
some and repugnant, for Ercilla's descriptive power was
very great. On the other hand, the poem lacks certain

lO LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

elements of general human interest so that it is not very
attractive to-day. It is too intensely Spanish in senti-
ment.

Its local Chilean setting, however, has brought great
popularity in Chile. Towns and localities have been
named after the Indian heroes. In their war for inde-
pendence Chilean orators and poets used to call them-
selves "sons of Caupolican." The first war vessel of the
Chilean navy was named "Lautaro." Episodes and in-
cidents from the Araucana which is held to be almost a
national poem, have been the inspiration of poems,
novels and plays.

After Ercilla's death a certain Diego de Santistevan
Osorio, of whom nothing beyond what he tells of himself
is known, published at Salamanca in 1597 a poem, La
Araucana, Quarta y Quinta parte en que se prosigue y
acaba la historia de D. Alonso de Ercilla. The adventures
related appear to be wholly imaginary combats between
the Indians and the Spaniards.

Another poem, Arauco Domado, treating the same
events in some sixteen thousand verses divided into
nineteen cantos, was printed at Lima in 1596. The author
was a native-born Chilean, Ee<iia_de._Qna,. the son of a
Spanish captain fighting the Indians in southern Chile.
He was sent to the University of San Marcos in Lima in
1590. Two years later he took part in an expedition to
Quito to quell an uprising. From this campaign he re-
turned with much historical material and possibly the
idea of putting into verse the deeds in the same region of
Don Garcia Hurtado de Mendoza.

In his poem Pedro de Oiia declared himself an imitator

THE COLONIAL PERIOD II

of Ercllla but made no pretension of competing with him.
The Arauco Domado is in no sense a continuation of the
Araucana but a new version of the historical facts con-
tained in the second part of the latter poem. The narra-
tive begins with the sending to Chile of his son, Don
Garcia, by the viceroy Don Andres Hurtado de Mendoza.
While Ercilla had written mainly about the Indians
with slight reference to Don Garcia, Pedro de Oiia de-
sired to repair this injustice by relating the personal
exploits of the Spanish commander. To emphasize the
part played by that nobleman, Pedro de Ona did not
hesitate to violate either unity of plan or chronological
order. His main narrative concerned the preparations
of the savages for an attack on a Spanish fort and its
successful defense by Don Garcia. The latter's subse-
quent acts as viceroy of Peru in subduing a rebellion in
Quito and in repelling the raid of the English admiral,
Richard Hawkins, were introduced into the poem through
the agency of the witch, Quidora, and the machinery of a
dream. Though the love affairs of the Indians were
fictions of the poet who invented them to relieve the
strain of continuous warfare, the descriptions of their
customs and those of the colonists have historical value.
The poetic idyll of Caupolican and Fresia 'and the ad-
ventures of Tucapel and Gualeva are interesting. Re-
garding the author the poem reveals little but his serious
and religious disposition.

Pedro de Ona remained to the end of his days a diligent
versifier. There exist from his pen a couple of sonnets;
a cancion of some length in which the river Lima addresses
the river Tiber on the virtues of Fray Francisco Solano

12 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

of Lima who after his canonization was made patron
saint of Santiago de Chile in 1633; a second herioc poem,
El Vasauroy found in manuscript in Madrid by Barros
Arana, on the deeds of Don Andres de Cabrera; and a mysti-
cal religious poem in six thousand verses divided in twelve
books on the life of Ignatius de Loyola, El Ignacio de
Loyola, Apparently the Jesuits requested Ofia to compose
this poem in honor of the founder of their society. No
commission could have been more agreeable to the pious
character of the poet as is partly shown by the care which
he bestowed on the versification and the ornate rhetoric.
Printed in Seville, 1636, the poem contributed to the
author's reputation far more than the Arauco Domado.
Lope de Vega in his Laurel de Apolo referring to this poem
puts the serious lyre of Pedro de Ofia "alone among the
swans of the Indies." Posterity may well consider Pedro
de Ofia as the foremost poet in Chile during colonial
times.

Another poem produced under the stimulus of the
prevailing fashion for heroic poems was found by Barros
Arana in Madrid without title and name of author. The
learned historian of the colonial literary history of Chile,
Jose Toribio Medina, argues that the author was an
unknown Juan de Mendoza mentioned by Alvarez de
Toledo. The poem after giving a summary of Chilean
history relates many minor events which occurred at the
end of the sixteenth century. Though the reader's interest
is rather harassed by the multiplicity of unconnected
happenings, the central fact of the tcoubled-stat^ of the
Spanish settlements stands out clearly.
\/ Hernando Alvarez de Toledo was another Spanish

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 13

warrior and colonist who pleased himself by the versifi-
cation of his personal adventures. He left Spain in 158 1
in company with the famous governor Alonso de Soto-
mayor, who after an unlucky voyage, landed in Brazil
and reached Chile by crossing the Argentine pampa
and the Andes. The fifteen thousand verses of Alvarez'
Puren Indbmito composed entirely without poetical in-
ventions or fictions form a rhymed chronicle of his own
feats of arms or those which he had heard in detail from
his companions. To him the Indians are merely wily
and treacherous enemies. Yet he gives many details
about their habits, dress, adornments, ceremonies, method
of fighting and the relations between them and the Span-
iards. At times he puts into the mouths of the natives
words about truth and the nature of God which are a
satire on the actions of bad Spaniai^ds. So great is his
adherence to fact that his statements are given full his-
torical value by the historian Ovalle. The latter credits a
portion of his history to the Jraucana, another poem by
Alvarez which has been lost.
\y^ Personal adventures formed the substance of another
long poem printed at Lima, 1630, entitled Compendio
historialde Chile by Melchor Xufre del Aguila (i 568-1637).
The author boasted that he had come out at his own ex-
pense. In the same year, 1 581, in which Don Garcia Hur-
tado de Mendoza was made viceroy of Peru, Xufre went
to Chile to seek adventures in the war. He got nothing
but a broken leg and loss of property. So he determined
to retire to a life of leisure in the country and write an
account of his experiences. His book has lent to it some
historical value by a long letter preceding the poem by

14 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

way of introduction from Luis Merlo de la Fuente, cap-
tain general of Chile, who outlines the events of his ad-
ministration from 1606 to 1628.

In prose, if one omits works written with a serious
purpose, few attempts at literature are to be found. Of
w these few one, Cautiverio feliz, by Francisco Nunez de
Pineda y Bascufian (1607-82), was the most popular and
widely read book of colonial times in Chile. The author,
the son of a soldier much feared by the Araucanians, was
placed by his father in a company of Spanish infantry
which was called in 1629 to put down an outbreak of the
Indians in southern Chile. The young man was one of
a detachment attacked by overwhelming numbers and
was taken prisoner with the few survivors. When the
Indians learned his parentage, they were greatly delighted
by their capture. Their leader Maulican determined to
keep him alive though the other leaders wished to put him
to death by torture. Bascufian remained in captivity
seven months before he was ransomed. In his old age he
wrote the story of it, leaving the manuscript to his chil-
dren. Though the narrative was intended for history, it
was written almost in the style of a novel. The reader is
kept in dramatic suspense to the end wondering whether
the good intentions of Maulican will prevail against the
desires of those who seek the captive's death. The book,
moreover, is a mine of curious facts about the Indians.

The romantic interest felt by some toward the natives
appears in a strange book, Restauracion de la Imperial y
conversion de almas infielesy by Fray Juan ~de_Ba.rreiaechea
y Albis, written in 1693. Medina classifies it as a novel.
It is a fiction concerning Rocamila, the beautiful daughter

y

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 15

of the Araucanian chief Millayan. Of her many lovers
the most favored was Carilab. Their wedding, however,
is postponed and their relations greatly troubled by the
war with the Spaniards and the multiplicity of adventures
which happen to them. The good friars and their efforts
to Christianize the Indians claim a part of the nar-
rative.

The habit of versifying history into which was incor-
porated one's personal adventures, possibly encouraged
by the popularity of Ercilla's poem, became widespread
in other centers of Spanish settlement than Chile. Most
of these compositions have been held in light esteem, on
the one hand by historians as untrustworthy and on the
other by writers on literature as prosaic. Apparently
the more prosaic the versification the more accurate was
the narration. In this respect the extreme is represented
by Caspar de Villagra*s Conquista del Nuevo Mundoy pub-
lished in 1610, a rhymed chronicle of the attempt by
Juan de Onate to settle in the country now called New
Mexico about the year 1598. Whatever the opinion else-
where, natives of the respective countries in which the
scenes of these historical poems were laid have regarded
them highly. To the local poet they have proved a con-
stant source of inspiration. To the local historian they
have supplied invaluable details of genealogy and local
history,
v^ J\ian_^e_Castellanos for this purpose contributed the
most important document of all. His Elegias de Varones
ilustres de Indias consisting of some 150,000 lines is the
longest poem of its kind in any language. The first part
only was printed during the life of its author, but the

X

l6 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

remainder appears to have been known though not printed
complete till the nineteenth century. Part one, published
in 1589, dealt with the voyages of Columbus and the early
conquests and settlements of the Caribbean islands and
the region near the mouth of the Orinoco, as well as the
adventures of the infamous Lope de Aguirre. The author
had already written part of his chronicle when a friend
persuaded him to rival Ercilla by versifying it. The
judgment of posterity believes he might better have stuck
to prose. Nevertheless Juan de Castellanos possessed
such an astonishing ability in versification that he wrote
occasional passages of real merit, so that from the point
of view of poetry his poem may be given second place
among versified chronicles. The second, third and fourth
parts treat minutely the history of Nueva Granada and a
part of Venezuela, with less attempt at poetic embellish-
ment as they approach the end.

Inferior in poetic qualities but priceless for its informa-
tion because no other records of the events of which it
treats has come down to us is La Argentina y conquista
del Rio de la Plata, con otros acaecimientos de las reinos del
Peru, Tucumdn y estado del Brasil, published at Lisbon,
1602, by Don_Martin del Jarco Centener^ The author
was a soldier who took part in the expedition led by
Juan Ortiz de Zarate into the interior of the Argentine.
The poem is also valuable for biographical matter con-
cerning Juan de Garay, the founder of Buenos Aires. As
its title indicates the poem lacks unity of subject-matter
and it is overloaded with fairy tales of golden kingdoms
and marvelous voyages. Redolent of the pampa, however,
are his descriptions of the life of the savages, their method

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 17

of hunting the wild ostrich with bolas, and the anecdotes
of their relations to each other and to the Spanish settlers.
Some of his love stories and episodes furnished excellent
material to later poets.

In Mexico the deeds of Cortes found their epic poet in

\ Antonio_de Saas^dra^Guzn^ who published his Peregrino
Indiano in twenty cantos of octaves in 1599. The author
says of himself that he was corregidor of Zacatecas and
that he spent seven years in collecting his material for
a true history. As to his value the historian Prescott,
who took a few details from his descriptions, estimated
it in this wise, "Saavedra came on the stage before all
that had borne arms in the conquest had left it." While
Saavedra's story is mainly an account of military exploits
from the moment of Cortes' departure from Cuba to the
capture of the city of Mexico after the building of the
ships in the lake, he does not neglect the amours of the
leaders with the native women. The book has the addi-
tional bibliographical interest of being the first printed
by a person born in Mexico.

Saavedra's poem was neither the first nor the last on
the same subject. Contemporaries praised highly the

><^lost work of ..Franri^co_dejre]Tgzag, whose sonnets show
real poetical feeling. The son of one of Cortes' most
trusted officers, he is the first native-bom Mexican poet.
A few octaves that have been preserved of his Nuevo
Mundo y Conquista show that Terrazas was especially
skillful in depicting idyllic love scenes. Another rhymed
chronicle, the Mexico conquistada of Juan de Escoiquiz
has been dismissed by an eminent critic as "intolerable."
On the other hand, the versification of Gabriel Lasso de \.

l8 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

la^Vega's Cortes Valeroso, published in 1588 with three
additional cantos in 1594, is praised. And even better
from the same point of view is the Hernandia of Francisco
X Ruiz de Lgdn though the matter of the poem printed in
1755 is little more than the versification of Antonio de
Solis' famous history of the conquest of Mexico.

In Peru, contemporary with the rich historical litera-
ture dealing with the conquest, were written many short
poems on various events. Pizarro*s exploits were related
in a poem of eight cantos which, however, was not printed
before 1848. In that year a bookseller of Lyons discovered
the manuscript in the library of Vienna. Another longer
manuscript poem in twenty cantos has for a title Armas
Antdrticas, hechos de los famosos Capitanes espanoles que
se hallaron en la conquista del Peru. Judging from such
extracts as he had seen the Spanish critic Menendez y
Pelayo rated its poetic qualities higher than those of the
more fortunate Lima Fundada 0 Conquista del Peru printed
in 1732 for its author Pedro de Peralta Bamuevo, the poet
laureate of the viceroys of his day.

These historical or heroic compositions on American
topics, so ambitiously termed epic poems by their authors,
form only a branch of the same tree which was flourishing
so lustily in Spain at the same period. An occasional
poem treating an event in Spanish history even saw the
light in America. Another thriving branch was the
sacred epic ramifying into poems on the lives of saints
and noted churchmen. Of the many poems in Spanish
on the life of the Saviour the most excellent in all respects
X was La Cristiada published in 161 1 bv_Frav Diego de
XH)Djedajwho wrote its eloquent octaves in a convent of

THE COLONIAL PERIOD I9

Lima. And in this outpouring of heroic verse what was
more natural than that many a friar in America should
desire thus to glorify the life of the founder of his order?
Poems in many cantos on the life of Ignatius de Loyola,
founder of the Jesuits, are especially numerous. Earlier
than that by Pedro de Ona, already mentioned, was one
by a friend of his, JLuis de Bejmonte^ Vida del Patriarca w
Ignacio de Loyola, published in Mexico in 1609 and dedi-
cated to the Jesuit fathers of Nueva Espafia. The Domin-
icans, not to be outdone by others, wrote in heroic verses
the life of their celebrity, the Angelical Doctor, Thomas
Aquinas. As if symbolic of his great learning the most
peculiar of these poems entitled La Thomasiada, was
composed by fray_piego Saenz Ovecurri and published \;
in Guatemala, 1667. The poem aimed to be not only a
biography but also a treatise on the art of poetry and a
sort of encyclopedia in rhyme of matter taken from the
works of the learned doctor. In the part relating to the
art of poetry, examples of the most extravagant experi-
ments in versification abound.

Of the lives of saints in heroic verse, two especially
achieved a certain reputation. The Gongorist title. La
eloquencia del silencio. Poema heroyco, vida y martyrio
del Gran Proto-Martyr del sacramental sigilo, fidelissimo
custodio de la Fama, y protector de la Sagrada Compania
de Jesus, San Juan Nepomuceno, is indicative of the style
of the contents of this poem by a Mexican jurist Miguel
de Reyna Zevallos, published in 1738. The other is far
more interesting, Fida de Santa Rosa de Lima y Patrona
del Peru by T.in'g Antnnin Hp Ovifidp y Hprrpra, Conde de XL
la Granja, published in 171 1. It is interesting not only

20 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

because it relates the life of the most popular saint of
America, Santa Rosa de Lima (as a measure of her popu-
larity may be taken a certain bibliographical list of 276
works referring to her), but also because it contains enter-
taining descriptions of the country near Lima, of the
raids of Drake and Hawkins on the Peruvian coast, and
many other curious anecdotes of the life of the colony.

In the matter of lyric verse there were numerous prac-
titioners of it at all periods in America. Students of
Spanish literature will remember that following the
manner of the poet-soldiers who brought back to Spain
from Italy the new forms there arose in Seville a school of
versifiers. A leading member of the school, Gutierre de

y_ Cetina, found his way to Mexico where in 1554 he was
severely wounded by a jealous lover who mistook him in
the dark for the object of his suspicions, a wound from
which the unlucky poet probably died three years later.
Another Sevillan poet who spent some time in Mexico was

y Jjuan_d£_la^Cueva^ Among his literary remains exists an
interesting description in tercets of the city of Mexico. So
numerous in fact were poets among the adventurers in
Mexico that at a poetical contest in 1585 no fewer than
three hundred (?) took part according to the testimony of
one of the winners.

"Til? latter was Bernardo de Balbuena (1^:68-1627) who
in later life became Bishop of Puerto Rico. And for the
feeling which his works show for the tropical luxuriance
of America he may be termed the first in point of time of
American poets. Balbuena's most important poem, La
Grandeza Mexicanay originally printed in Mexico in 1604,
and many times reprinted, even in the nineteenth cen-

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 21

tury, sets forth the beauties and wonders of Mexico, its
wealth in precious metals and jewels, the strange costume
of its inhabitants, its fiery horses, the rich fabrics brought
thither in transit from China and the Philippine Islands.
The poem is written in tercets and divided into nine parts.
In 1608 he published El Sigh de Oro en las Selvas de
ErifiUy a. pastoral novel in prose and verse, the latter
consisting of twelve eclogues in imitation of Theocritus,
Virgil, and Sannazaro. For its value as a monument of
Spanish literature the Spanish Academy made a special
edition of it in 1821. No less ambitious was Balbuena in
vying with Ariosto in his longest poem El Bernardo 0 la
Victoria de Roncesvalles in twenty-four cantos. In one of
them the hero is conveyed to Mexico where the Tlascalan
wizard reveals to him the future conquest of Mexico.

Of Spanish versifiers who visited Lima about the be-
ginning of the seventeenth century the names of those
known to Cervantes and Lope de Vega are very numerous.
In real poetic worth a certain anonymous poetess who
corresponded in rhymed epistles with Lope de Vega, sign-
ing herself " Amarilis," excelled the rest. And no specula-
tion as to the identity of the lady has proved successful.
At the court of the viceroys who were themselves of the
highest Spanish Ifobllity were many individuals of noble
rank. And the customs of their gay society demanded
much scribbling of verse's as well as dramatic representa-
tions. The Prince of_Esquilache> viceroy from 161 5 to x
1622, himself possesses a place in Spanish literature as a
poet of the second rank, author of epistles and sonnets in
the manner of Argensola and of an epic poem Ndpoles
recuperada. His own works contain no references to his

22 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

sojourn in the new world, but it is known that he main-
tained a sort of literary academy in his residence.

Of books of verse produced during colonial times a few
deserve mention. The Primera parte del Parnaso Antdrtico
de obras amatorias by Diego Mexia was printed in 1608.
The title refers to a very praiseworthy translation of Ovid's
Heroides which the author, as he himself relates, made in a
long journey from Lima to Mexico. The prologue to his
book is interesting for the references to his journey.

The Miscelanea austral printed in Lima in 1603, though
primarily a series of forty-four colloquies by its author,
o 2iego^e^A^valosxEigHSI!95> ^^ ^11 sorts of subjects of most
diverse character, love, jealousy, music, horses, the origin
of rings, contains many verses by others as well as a long
poem in six cantos. La Defensa de DamaSy in which Diego
de Avalos attempts to refute by anecdotes those who
write ill of ladies.

A sort of anthology Ramillete de varias flores poeticas
-^ recogidas by ]^q\ntci de Evja^ a native of Guayaquil, offers
an idea of the state of poesy in 1675. At that date Gon-
gorism was the fashion in Spain and Evia's Sevillan master
of rhetoric, Antonio Bastidas, whose own poems are really
the best in the book, had taught him the secret of pre-
ciosity. The third poet whose lines appear here was a
^ native of Bogota, Hemanjo Dominguez Camargo. As a
sample of his conceits may be taken some verses in which
he compares the water of a certain cascade to a bull or to
a stallion about to be dashed to pieces against the rocks.
Dominguez Camargo was the author also of a Gongorist
poem on the life of Ignatius of Loyola. The Ramillete
is a curious book whose verses of occasion, sonnets and

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 23

inscriptions, and extracts in artificial prose convey a lively
idea of life in Ecuador.

Books of verse very popular in Lima, if one can judge
by the number of manuscript copies which seem to have
existed, were the Diente del Parnaso and Poesias varias of
Juan del Valle y Caviedes, Their interest lay in the
sparkling Andalusian wit of the author's lines. He was
born the son of a Spanish merchant and had been sent at
about the age of twenty to Spain where he remained three
years. On his return to Lima about 1681 he fell sick as the
result of dissipation. He whiled away his convalescence
by writing satiric verses on his doctors whom he lampooned
by name. His verses circulated in manuscript and were
undoubtedly increased in number by other wits who put
their smart and possibly obscene productions under his
name. It is noteworthy that at such an early period the
characteristic of later Peruvian literature, its gayety and
humor, thus made its appearance.

At the close of the seventeenth and the opening of the
next century there were born in Peru several men of re-
markable mental equipment who deserved to have fallen
on an epoch more propitious in inspiration. By that date
the ravages of Gongorism were at their height in Spanish
literature and precisely by a defense of Gongora, Apol-
ogetico en favor de D. Luis de Gongora, published in 1694 has
the learned doctor Ju3ii_.ii£_JEspinosa_^ledrano distin- y
guished himself. The book is a creditable piece of literary
criticism and gives evidence of the ability of a man who at
fourteen years of age composed autos and comedies and at
sixteen filled a professorial chair in the university of Cuzco
where he taught all his life, beside being connected with

24 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

the cathedral in various capacities. He left behind also
volumes of sermons and theological works. A poem of his
El Aprendiz de Rico which draws a moral from the con-
demnation and death of a silver miner for counterfeiting
coin throws an interesting light on a phase of existence
in that ancient capital of the Incas.

The doctor of Cuzco was not, however, such a marvel
of encyclopedic knowledge and literary accomplishment as
P^drnjje Peralfa BarnuevoJg^ochR y Renayides. Of his
heroic poem Lima Fundada mention has already been
made. He was by profession professor of mathematics in
the university of Lima and made some astronomical
observations on eclipses the results of which he published.
In fact his works, including his scientific essays on military
and civil engineering, on metallurgy, on navigation, on
history, number no less than forty-eight between 1700 and
1740. Beside being several times rector of the university
he was the poet laureate of the viceroy. For that reason
his name appears on the many volumes of verses which
record the feasts and funerals of the period. ~ He wrote
likewise several pieces for the stage beside a meritorious
adaptation of Corneille's Rodogune. His contemporary
the Spaniard P. Feijoo reckoned him the equal of the most
erudite men of Europe.

The custom of celebrating public events by issuing
volumes of bombastic and laudatory verses was not con-
fined to Peru but was practiced in Mexico too. And in
general the bulk of Mexican verse is not only greater but
on account of a few artificers it ranks better in quality. A
stimulus to such abundant production was the custom of
poetic contests.

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 25

One of the best poems of the seventeenth century was so
much admired that numberless imitations and glosses of it
were written and it is to-day pleasant reading, Cancion a la
Vista de un Desengaiioy by a Jesnjr Father Mafias dp
Bocanegra. It is divided into six parts on the following
theme: A young monk is listening to the song of a linnet.
The bird would not sing in a cage he is sure. Just so the
loss of his liberty irks him and he complains. He decides
to break his vows and enter the world. Before he can
carry out his determination he is confounded to see a
falcon seize and rend the linnet. The thought comes to
him that if the weaker bird had been protected by a cage
it would not have suffered death. It died because it was
free. The moral of this lesson prevents the young monk
from breaking his vows.

One wishes that more of the verse by friars had been
written with such poetic simplicity of expression rather
than in the tedious conceits of such poems on set religious
topics as appear in the book entitled Triumpho parthenico
que en glorias de Maria Santissima inmaculadamente
concebida celehro la Pontifical Imperial^ y Regia Academia
Mexicana etc. . . . Describelo D. Carlos de Siguenza y
Gongora^ Mexicano, y en ella cathedrdtico propietario de
Mathemdticas. En Mexico i68j. The professor in his
poetic style, even in his earlier poem published in 1668,
Primavera Indiana, Poema sacro-historico, idea de Maria
Santissima de Guadalupe, lived up to the tradition of his
maternal name of Gongora. This poem narrated in
seventy-nine royal octaves the story of the appearance to
the baptized Indian Juan Diego of our Lady of Guada-
lupe. Since the building of the church on the spot desig-

26 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

nated by her radiant apparition, the native religion ma-
terially declined. The present rich edifice dedicated to
the patron saint of Mexico was built during the lifetime
of Sigiienza y Gongora (i 645-1 700). As a cyclopedic
scholar he was only equalled in America by the Peruvian
doctor Peralta de Bamuevo. Sigiienza made many
scientific and archaeological studies. Useful is his study
of the Aztec calendar which he investigated for the pur-
pose of establishing the chronology of that people. From
his pen came numerous works on mathematics and as-
tronomy which must be respected for their learning though
they bear such titles as a certain Belerofonte matemdtico
contra la Quimera astrologica.

Toward the end of the seventeenth century a real poetic
genius saw the light in Mexico. Being a woman and a
poetess she was styled in accord with the bombast of
the time "la Musa Decima mexicana," that is to say
"the Tenth Muse a Mexican woman." She was born
Ju^na Inesje Asbaje y Ramjrez^de Cantillana (1651-9^ .
At seventeen years of age she became~^ir~nun, assuming
the name Sor Juana Ines je la Cruz, by which title she
has since been known. She was possessed of the most
intense intellectual curiosity. At one time she had gath-
ered in her cell a library of no less than four thousand
volumes. Her fame in wojrldly learning and in profane
literature causing the Bishop of Puebla some worry, he
wrote her a letter over the signature of " Sor Philotea de
la Cruz" beseeching her as an admiring sister to have a
care for her soul. She replied in a letter which the bishop
had printed with the title of Carta athenogorica.

Its theme was a defense of the education of women,

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 27

but its interest to the world now consists in the bio-
graphical details concerning the writer. Very little else
is known. She learned to read at the age of three. At
eight she composed a loa in honor of the holy sacrament.
At about the same time she begged her parents to send
her up to the University of Mexico dressed as a man.
However she had to content herself with twenty lessons
in Latin in which language she acquired proficiency by
her own unaided efforts. Becoming a maid of honor to
the vicereine of Mexico, she was "tormented for her
wit and pursued for her beauty," until she took the veil
in the convent of San Geronimo. From that moment
her cell was her study. A certain superior at one time
forbade her to use her books. She obeyed for three months
but though she neglected her books she "studied all the
things which God created." Though in her reply to the
admonition of Sor Philotea, she defended her course of
life, yet she was moved to sell her books and devote her
mind to acts of piety. Shortly thereafter she died a
victim of an epidemic.

Her collected literary works fill three volumes. The
first was printed in 1698 with the florid title Inundacibn
Castdlida de la unica poetisa, musa decimal sor Juana Ines
de la Cruz, The third volume published after her death
was entitled Fama y Ohras postumas del Fenix de Mexico,
decima musa, poetisa americana, sor Juana Ines dda Cruz,
Some of her productions were printed separately, as the
verses indited in celebration of the arrival of the Conde
de Pa redes as viceroy, and called Neptuno alegorico,
oceano de colores, simulacro politico, Sor Juana wrote not
only verses but plays. For the Condesa de ares Fed she

28 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

composed an Auto sacramental del Divino Narciso, por
alegorias. Like their titles these compositions are Gon-
goristic. In fact her contemporaries praised her most
lighly for her most obscure compositions. On the other
hand, she wrote many poems instinct with sincere feeling
and unclouded by the pedantic taste of the epoch. Her
lyrics suggest that her passionate temper was not always
stirred solely by mystical love nor by feigned jealousy.
Those verses of hers which have been best remembered
were satirically directed against the detractors of women,
foolish men who are to blame for the very faults in women
that they censure. As for her rank in the world of letters,
after the Cuban Gertrudis Gomez de Avellaneda, the
second place among women of American birth who have
written in Spanish may be rightfully accorded to Sor
Juana Ines de la Cxxxl^

Her death was followed by the literary sterility of the
eighteenth century. The only Mexican writer of Cas-
tilian worthy of mention in this period was Francisco
^ Ruiz de Leon whose Hernandia was a last effort to write
epic poetry on the subject of the conquest of Mexico. He
was the author of a devout poem in three hundred and
thirty-three decimas with the alluring title Mirra duke
para aliento de pecadores. The mainstay of literature,
the friars began to neglect the vernacular for Latin. Of
these Latinists there is a formidable list. A certain
Jesuit father Rafael Landivar is the only one sufficiently
original to have left behind any literary influence. A
long poem in fifteen books, Rusticatio mexicana, in the
style of the Georgics of Virgil, set forth the natural beau-
ties and wonders of America. Descriptive poetry of this

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 29

sort, beginning with Balbuena^s Grandeza mexicana, has
a long history in America. Parts of Landivar's poem
were not only translated by some into Spanish but were
imitated by others.

Ruiz de Leon's Mirra duke by some peculiar chance
happened to be one of the first books of verse printed in
Bogota. Colombia was not an especially fertile field for
the cultivation of letters. Contemporary with Sor Juana
and inditing verses to her was a certain Francisco Alvarez
de Velasco y Zorrilla. And in prose there exist two books
which the Colombians are proud to exhibit as productions
of their early literary history, Sentimientos Espirituales
by a nun Francisca Josefa de la Concepcion, known also
as the Madre^£astillo and an autobiography, Vida de la
venerable Madre Castillo.

In the neighboring territory of Ecuador poetic and
literary activity seems to have been a little greater. A
Jesuit father, Juan_deJVelasco, himself the author of an
interesting Historia del reino de Quito, preserved the
verses of his contemporaries which he prepared for the
press in a miscellany in six volumes, entitled El Ocioso de
Faenza. The best of these poems show a real feeling for
nature.

One activity of the friars should by no means be over-
looked. They interested themselves keenly in the native
languages for the purpose of teaching the aborigines the
gospel of Christ. Grammars and dictionaries, catechisms
and books of devotion in the native tongues abound.
And stranger still there exist plays, many of religious
character whose intent is obvious. The friars, finding in
the native dances something of a dramatic character,

30 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

from the first made use of this rudimentary drama to
further their eflForts in converting the Indians. It was an
easy matter to turn into the native tongues the religious
plays or autos of which the Spaniards were so fond for
their own edification. But secular plays were also adapted.
Three plays of Lope de Vega are said to have existed in a
Mexican dialect, Nahuatl. To literary historians a cer-
tain drama in the Peruvian or Quechua language, Ollantdy
has long presented a problem of interest.

The argument of the play is briefly as follows: Ollanta
(or Ollantay) is a chief of lowly birth who meets parental
opposition in his love for Cusi-Coyllur (Joy-star), daughter
of the Inca. Her father dismisses the young man's suit
with anger. The Andean mountaineers among whom
Ollanta has taken refuge make him their king, with
Ollantay-Tambo as his stronghold. After a few years
the old Inca dies and his sop^lma-Sumac reigns in his
stead. The ten-year-old daughter of Ollanta and Cusi-
Coyllur appears on the scene as an inmate of the convent
where the elect virgins of the sun reside in Cuzco. She
discovers that her mamer is kept there a prisoner. By
treachery Ollanta isyoound in chains and brought before
the Inca. The latter however pardons him. At that
moment Ima-Syi/nac rushes into the Inca's court and
tearfully relates the cruelties inflicted on her;, mother
in prison. Thejnca and Ollanta go to the convent of
the elect virgins. Both recognize Cusi-Coyllur who is
released by the command of the Inca and given in mar-
riage to Ollanta.

It was formerly believed that this play was a relic of
a Quechuan literature. The early Spanish historians,

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 3 1

notably the Inca Garcilasso de la Vega testified that a
rude form of drama existed among the Peruvians. But
investigation has revealed not only that the rhetorical
structure of Ollanta is that of a Spanish drama but also
it is written in meters peculiar to Spanish, such as re-
dondillas, quintillas and decimas. Much printer's ink
has been shed over this play and its authorship. The
last and most thorough study of it, that of Prof. E. C.
Hills, seems to show that a certain Antonio Valdes, parish
priest of Tinta, who produced it with great pomp be-
tween 1770 and 1780, was its author.

Other clergymen familiar with the native tongue used
the drama to assist their religious teaching. The learned
doctor Juan_de_Es£iaQsa_Medranp, was the author of an
Auto sacramental del Hijo Prodigo in which the scriptural
story of the prodigal son is edifyingly set forth with realistic
details. Another considerable play in the Quechua lan-
guage has for title Usca Paucar, by an unknown author.
The dramatic quality of this play is meager, but its theme
shows that it was intended to urge upon the natives the
veneration of the Virgin at the chapel of our Lady of
Copacabana.

This church stood on the south shore of Lake Titicaca
where the aborigines had a sanctuary before the coming
of the Spaniards. To adorn their mission the Augustinians
by whose care it was maintained, brought from Spain an
old painting of the Virgin. This way of converting the
natives was similar to that pursued in Mexico at the
establishment of the church of our Lady of Guadalupe.
And while the relative greater importance of the latter
has evoked more devotional verse, our Lady of Copaca-

32 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

bana had the signal honor of being staged in a play by
Calderon, La Aurora en Copacabana, who drew his argu-
ment either from a poem El Santuario de Nuestra Senora
de Copacabana, by Fray Fernando de Valverde, or a prose
narrative of the mission of the Augustinian fathers.

The history of the drama in Spanish America, apart
from the loas and allegorical pieces produced to celebrate
some viceroy's arrival, is obscure. The thorough estab-
lishment of the theater in Mexico is plain, however, from
Balbuena's testimony, who refers to the production of
"new comedies every day." Among the Spanish poets
who sought fortune in America were several dramatists,
as Juan de la Cueva and Luis de Belmonte Bermudez.
One of the most famous of the Spanish dramatists of the
golden period was on the other hand bom in Mexico,
Tuan Ruiz de Alarcon (died 1639). Though contemporary
with Lope de Vega, his plays were distinguished from
the latter's by a greater care for form and a more careful
psychological analysis of the characters. Alarcon's sober-
ness and the epigrammatic quality of his style were, in
the opinion of a recent critic, Pedro Henriquez Urena,
the contributions of his Mexican birth. The high altitude
of central Mexico seems to tone down the native exuber-
ance of the Andalusian. It is possible too that Alarcon
learned the dramatic art in Mexico where two of his pub-
lished comedies, El semejante a si mismo and Mudarse
por mejorarsey may have been written, since they abound
in expressions peculiar to Mexico.

A dramatist whose whole career was spent in Mexico,
though he was probably bom in Spain, was femanGon-
zalez de Eslava. His works have been preserved in a

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 33

book printed in 16 10, years after his death, with the title,
Coloquios espirituales y Poesias sagradas. Though the
form of his plays is mainly the allegorical, he introduces
in the dialogue an endless series of everyday characters
whose language, full of idioms and even vulgarisms, re-
veals as no other book the speech current in Mexico at
that period.

The colonial history of Spanish America is faithfully
mirrored in its literary productions. The prose narratives
and the heroic poems picture the period of discovery and
conquest during the sixteenth century. As the viceroys'
courts become more important in the seventeenth century
poems of occasion represent the secular side of life, while
the friars* interests are revealed in devotional writing in
verse and prose, in dramas intended for instruction, and
in miscellaneous works in both the vernacular and Latin
concerning the activities of their orders. At the be-
ginning of the eighteenth century a profound lethargy
descends on colonial life which remains almost unbroken
till the great upheaval of the revolutionary period in the
early years of the nineteenth century.

There were, however, a few stirrings which broke the
calm in the different countries. In Mexico the prerevolu-
tionary awakening centers in Fray Manuel de Navarrete y^
( 1 768-1 809). This Franciscan friar endeavored to restore
poetry by founding a literary society, the "Arcadia
mexicana" and by writing anacreontics of shepherds and
shepherdesses in the style of the Spanish poet Melendez,
but without a hint of sensuality. His eclogues were writ-
ten on the other hand after the manner of Garcilaso de la
Vega. Navarrete displayed more originality, or at least

34 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

a personal note, in his religious verse. As his style was
fluent and musical he attracted admirers who followed
him in his classicism. But they lived to witness the
revolution and wrote under its inspiration their more
important pieces. The poetic style of the Mexican revolu-
tionary poets is rather better than those of other regions,
a fact to which Navarrete's influence may have contrib-
uted.

Over South America a wave of scientific investigation
in all departments of natural history and physical geog-
raphy spread during the last half of the eighteenth cen-
tury. In Bogota, the capital of the new viceroyalty of
Nueva Granada established in 1740, a botanist and scien-
V tist of the first rank, Jqrq Cp^p<?ti"0 Mm-is, a Spaniard,
began his teaching in 1762. A whole generation of en-
thusiastic students were trained in his classes. The most
brilliant of them was Francisco Jose Caldas who became
the master's successor. Caldas, as one branch of his
studies, formed a herbarium of five to six thousand plants
of this region of America, accompanied by an exhaustive
account of the diff'erent altitudes and localities where
each plant throve. As director of the astronomical ob-
servatory he made many useful studies of various charac-
ter some of which he made public in a special periodical
El Semanario de la Nueva Granada. To this journal
many contributed both scientific articles and even verses.
And it was this little group of lovers of science who first
conspired against the hegemony of Spain. Some of them
were sent as prisoners to Spain while others, among them
Caldas, met their death from the rifles of a firing party in
1816.

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 3$

In Ecuador the scientific spirit as embodied in a skillful
physician, Dr. Francisco Eugenio de Santa Cruz y Espejo.
paid attention to the subject of education. In 1779 he
put into circulation his Nuevo Luciano 0 despertador de
ingenios. It was a critical satire in dialogue form which
exposed the evils of the prevailing system of education.
Later Dr. Espejo satirized personally the Spanish colonial
minister, an exploit which cost him a year in prison and
banishment to Bogota. There his writings assisted in
preparing the revolution.

In Peru science was fostered by the viceroy Francisco
Y Q\\ de Tahoadaj who had been an admiral in the Spanish
navy. He permitted the establishment of a society "Los
Amantes del Pais'* and the publication, 1791, of a journal
El Mercurio peruana which was mainly devoted to scien-
tific topics. The editor and most learned contributor was
Dr. Hipolito Unanue, professor of medicine in the univer-
sity.

But the most celebrated literary production of this
epoch in Lima was at the opposite pole of seriousness and
respectability. The name of the book which has been
many times reprinted was Lima por dentro y fuera by
"Simon Ayanque,'* a pseudonym of Esteban de Terralla
y Landa. The author was an Andalusian who eked out a
living by writing verses of occasion. In 1792 he published
his satire of the types of individuals in Lima. The title-
page of the book gives a hint of the levity and even the
obscenity of some of its seventeen romances. The eccle-
siastical authorities considered suppressing it but such
action was not necessary to complete its popularity. Its
literary value, even as a provocative to laughter, has been

36 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

unanimously denied by critics, but its ready sale both to
contemporaries and to later generations, especially in a
certain edition embellished by colored drawings, testifies
to an element of truth in its portraiture.

Satire of the authorities was about the only method
by which discontent at this time could express itself. In
Chile a mock epic La Tucapelinuy which for the personal
safety of its author circulated in manuscript, burlesqued
the captain general and his deputies for their part in the
restoration of a church at Tucapel in 1783. This poem
and certain others descriptive of disasters in Chile seem
now at least to echo rumblings of the approaching storm
of revolution.

Across the Andes from Chile on the shores of the Atlantic
the eighteenth century witnessed the rapid growth of the
commerce of Buenos Aires. In 1776 the vast region now
known as Argentina including most of modern Bolivia
y^ was established as a viceroyalty. To Jjianjfise ^Verd^,
viceroy from 1778 to 1784, the city of Buenos Aires owed
its first steps in transition from a wretched town to a
modem capital. He founded all manner of public works,
a system of street lighting, a college, a hospital, an orphan
asylum, and even a theater. For the benefit of the orphan
asylum he established a printing press so that the first
book printed in Buenos Aires dates from his administra-
tion.

As the first rector of his new Colegio de San Carlos,

Y Vertiz appointed Jiian_Jtali-asar Mayiel (i 727-88), an

ecclesiastic of liberal tendencies and wide reading owning

the best library of the city. Maziel was an interesting

personality who wrote much in prose and verse. Two

THE COLONIAL PERIOD 37

satirical sonnets of his brought him into conflict with a
subsequent viceroy, the Marques de Loreto, who sum-
marily seized his person and transported him to Mon-
tevideo. Maziel died before the news of his own vin-
dication by the Spanish king's order reached America.
About Maziel there sprang up a literary circle.

His friend and defender in the controversy over the
sonnets Manuel Jose de Labarden (i 754-1 809) was a v
man of unusual literary ability. His claims on fame are
two, an ode Al Parana, and a play Siripo, both the more
remarkable as anticipating subsequent Argentine litera-
ture. The verses descriptive of the great river penetrating
far to the interior were the first about the landscape from
which so many later poets drew their inspiration. Siripo
is a play treating the relations of the white men and the
aborigines. It breathes of the pampa. The life of the
pampa in the form of gaucho poetry makes the originality
of Argentine verses and plays.

The story of Siripo y drawn from an early chronicle,
was frequently rehandled by others. A young white
woman, Lucia Miranda, in a raid on the settlements, was
taken captive by the cacique Siripo. Her husband joined
her in captivity. Siripo condemned him to death but
offered him his life on condition that he marry into the
tribe while Lucia became Siripo's bride. The pair refuse.
Their faithfulness to each other so exasperated the savage
that he had them put cruelly to death.

This drama was first represented in the carnival of
1789 and immediately brought its author renown. The
play had been long written however for Labarden read
some of the scenes at Maziel's house. Moreover, in his

38 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

youth Labarden had been a student at Chuquisaca in
upper Peru where he was on intimate terms with Valdes,
the discoverer or author of the Quechua drama Ollantd,
In Valdes' small collection of dramatic books Labarden
had his only opportunity to learn the dramatic art. And
it is possible that Valdes' reading of Ollantd gave Labar-
den the idea of writing Siripo.

Labarden's ode Al Parana embellished the first number
of the first periodical printed in Buenos Aires, April i,
1 80 1, El Telegrafo mercantil rural politico, economico, e
historiografo del Rio de la Plata. An outlet for the thoughts
of the restless spirits whose education had been acquired
in Vertiz' Colegio de San Carlos was thus supplied. After
a year's successful publication its suppression was caused
by the satires of a festive versifier. But the ground was
prepared. Other papers followed. The means of pub-
licity and the ability to write were at hand when in the
first decade of the nineteenth century the4dea of revolu-
tion spread abroad in this part of Amaiica which first
successfully asserted its independence from Spain.

CHAPTER II

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD

The literature of the revolutionary period sprang di-
rectly from the hearts of men, a literature of occasion in-
spired by the hopes and aspirations of the colonials or the
events of their warfare against the mother country. To
comprehend its meaning then one must follow its produc-
tion step by step under the stress of the mighty struggle.

Its forms were often rude and uncouth because literary
models within reach of the writers were few. In Chile
for example Camilo Henriquez patterned his verses on a
single volume of the poems of Tomas Iriarte, the only book
of poetry which he could find in Santiago. The scarcity
of books in Spanish America was due in part to the ob-
scurantist policy of the Spanish government. In the reign
of Carlos IV, when a question arose concerning the chair
of mathematics in the University of Caracas the king
abruptly dismissed the matter by the dictum, "It is not
expedient to educate the Americans." Education had
fallen to a low plane in Spain itself so that the state of
culture in the mother country was naturally reflected in
the colonies.

The lack of books was aggravated by the scarcity of
printing presses. Though printing presses were set up in
Lima and Mexico in the sixteenth century, there were
none in Havana before 1787 nor in Chile before 1811. To

39

40 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Venezuela the first press was brought by General Miranda
in 1806 as a weapon to spread the propaganda of revolt.

— Moreover, the importation of books was opposed by the
authorities who believed them to be agents of sedition.
In 1797 the royal audiencia of Venezuela, reporting on the
revolutionary fiasco of that year, noted as one of the
causes, "the introduction of papers from the foreign islands
and the old world in spite of the vigilance of the author-
ities." But an interesting light is thrown on the quality
of their vigilance or their intelligence by an anecdote con-
cerning an importation of books into Chile. A set of such
pernicious writings as the works of the French Ency-
clopedists was successfully passed through the customs by
the simple expedient of affixing to the volumes theological
titles.
N^ The friction between Spain and her colonies had its
roots in the disposition of the government to exploit the
/ new world for the benefit both economically and admin-
( istratively of the old. The Spaniards assumed and main-

^tained a monopoly of the trade with the colonies. The

latter were compelled to buy only Spanish goods or goods
brought in Spanish ships. In the matter of administration
immigrants direct from Spain were favored over the chil-
dren of the second generation who were known as Creoles
-— - (criollos). In fact the latter were generally excluded from
office holding. Spanish officials were forbidden to marry
daughters of the Creoles. If sometimes royal favor lifted
the ban, the lucky couple were transferred to another dis-
trict than that of the bride's residence. Political disabil-
ities had quite as much influence in preparing the colonial
mind for revolt as the economic restrictions.

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 4I

The form of government which the rebellious colonies

set up was that of a democracy. But fundamentally their ]
governments were oligarchic. A league of families in each
country maintained in varying degrees the colonial system
in which the great body of the people had little part. The
years of turmoil, not yet ended in some countries, which
followed the separation from Spain denote the struggle
of the crowd to win its share in the government.

The distress and confusion in Spain caused by the
Napoleonic invasion brought the colonials their opportu- - -
nity. The condition of affairs was first made clear to
America by the English attempt in 1806 to seize and hold
the city of Buenos Aires. On account of the relations be-
tween France and Spain at that time, the captain general
of the provinces of the river Plate was a Frenchman by
the name of Jacques de Liniers. Though the English
landed a body of troops under General William Beresford,
and occupied the city, Liniers organized a large volunteer
force which, ably seconding his few regular soldiers, suc-
ceeded in compelling the surrender of the invaders. The
next year another English expeditionary army under
General Whitelock met a similar fate after severe fighting
in the streets of the city.

This successful defense of Buenos Aires had a remark- -
able effect on the minds of the citizens. In the first place
it made them conscious of their collective strength. In
the second place the innumerable ballads and verses which
appeared in print extolling their deeds of valor filled .,
their spirits with truculence and their imaginations with
visions of glory. When the occasion offered in 18 10 they
were ready to see them realized in a fight against Spain.

42 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

The title "poet of the English invasions" has been con-
ferred on Pantaleon Rivarola (1754-1821). But the
poetic worth of his compositions like those of Jose Prego
de Oliver, Fray Cayetano Rodriguez, and many other
balladists, is slight. Rivarola's longest effort, Romance
heroico de la Reconquista, was written for recitation to the
accompaniment of the guitar, but it was a very prosaic
detailed account of the fighting. Greater artistic merit
may be claimed for the Triunfo Argentino of Vicente Lopez
y Planes (i 784-1 856) who served as captain in a famous
company called "Los Patricios." This ballad has vigor
of movement and at times almost epic interest. Lopez'
celebrity rests however on his national hymn adopted as
such by the national assembly in 18 13.

The part played by the volunteers from Montevideo
in retaking Buenos Aires from the English was set forth
in an allegorical drama, La Lealtad mas acendrada y
Buenos Aires vengada, by Juan Francisco Martinez, a
native of Uruguay. The two cities are represented as
nymphs dwelling in a forest. Montevideo, inspired and
protected by Mars, undertakes the rescue of Buenos Aires
from Neptune, the protector of the English.

For his part in the defense of Buenos Aires, Liniers was
appointed viceroy. When Napoleon Bonaparte's brother
Joseph became king of Spain, 1808, a revolt against the
French broke out with violence in all Spain. The na-
tionalist party wished to restore Ferdinand VII to power.
In America riots occurred in the principal capitals and
a "junta" or committee of citizens attempted to take over
the powers of government "in the name of Ferdinand
VII." These juntas were patterned after the central

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 43

junta of Sevilla which was managing the rebellion in
Spain. Consequently when it fell to pieces in 18 10 the
American juntas were left as it were hanging in the air.
In Buenos Aires the situation was met by the gathering of
an armed assembly. Liniers had been superseded as vice-
roy by Baltasar de Cisneros and a party in the assembly
wished to make him president. This movement was de-
feated, and Cisneros withdrew to Montevideo. Henceforth
the assembly ruled. The date of its first meeting, May 25th,
has since been regarded as the Argentine national holiday.

One of the assembly's first acts, June 7th, 18 10, was the
establishment of a semiweekly official journal, La Gaceta
de Buenos Aires. The director of this organ was also the
secretary of the junta, Mariano Moreno (i 778-1 811).
To the projects of this ardent democrat and the articles by
which he urged them, the cause of the revolution in
Argentina was greatly indebted. He brought about the
establishment of the national library for which J. B.
Maziel's books formed a nucleus. In the name also of
liberty of thought he effected the establishment of a school
of mathematics partly for training officers for the army.
Finally as the Argentine people were preparing for na-
tional defense, he was sent on a diplomatic mission to
England with full powers to conclude any international
arrangement. But his feeble health broke down en route
and he died at sea.

Preparation for the armed defense of Buenos Aires was
largely entrusted to Manuel Belgrano(i 770-1 820). Rally-
ing the young men under the colors sky-blue and white,
now those of the Argentine flag, he made ready to meet
the Spanish army advancing from Upper Peru. At the

44 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

same time there was danger from the forces in Montevideo
though the gaucho leader Artigas was besieging the city
on the landward side assisted at sea by a daredevil Irish-
man, William Brown, in command of a few poor ships.
Belgrano advanced to Tucuman, about eight hundred
miles northwest of Buenos Aires. He had collected a
goodly body of gauchos who on the day of the fight broke
the strength of the Spanish army. Occurring in Septem-
ber, 1 812, this battle resulted in such a victory that Buenos
Aires was never again seriously threatened by a Spanish
army. Belgrano proceeded toward Upper Peru but a
year later was caught at a disadvantage and completely
defeated in October of 1 813. On his return to the city he
was sent to Spain to try to arrange a settlement on the
basis of autonomy for Argentina, but the Spanish govern-
ment rejected his suggestions. On July 9th, 1816, a
congress of the Argentine provinces in session at Tucuman
formally declared themselves independent of Spain. Bel-
grano's services have never been forgotten by the Argen-
tines. And a young poet, Juan C. Lafinur, who left the
university to enlist in Belgrano's army, won fame for
himself by certain elegies which he wrote at the time of
the leader's death.

The student of the revolution must not forget that
everywhere existed active partisans of Spanish interests.
These loyalists had to be persuaded either by force or by
rhetoric to join the revolution. To some the appeal was
made through the press; to others by speeches in public
meetings, by verses and patriotic songs. In Buenos
Aires the poets vied with each other in writing a national
anthem. Esteban de Luca, Fray Cayetano Rodriguez

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 45

and Vicente Lopez y Planes, each produced one which
for a season enjoyed popularity. But in 1813 the national
congress of which Lopez y Planes was a member, decreed
that his "Marcha patriotica should be sung at all official
festivals and that at dawn of the anniversaries of the 25th
of May, the school children should meet in the public
town square to salute the rising sun with the national
anthem."

Beginning with the clarion call,

Old, mortales, el grito sagrado,
Libertad, libertad, libertad!

the song sought to arouse hatred of the oppressor and
especially of certain leaders of the Spanish army, who,
having been born in America, were called "vile." The
several strophes were packed with allusions to recent
events. In this close touch with reality the Argentine
national anthem differed from those of other countries
largely composed of abstract commonplaces. Certain
phrases, such as "a new and glorious nation," "a lion
bowed at her feet," and the term "argentino" recurring
several times, caught the popular fancy. People had
printed on their visiting cards designs to represent these
notions. Its expressions of hatred for Spaniards were so
ferocious that late in the nineteenth century, after futile
efforts to substitute a milder hymn, the president of the
republic decreed that only the first and last quatrains
and the chorus which were free of offense should be sung
at public celebrations. Its author, Lopez y Planes, at-
tained political prominence and late in life even became
provisional president of Argentina.

46 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

The fierce hatred of the rebelling colonials has always
been resented by Spaniards as unjust. They have specially
ridiculed the colonial tendency to identify their own cause
with that of the aborigines. How can the descendants
of Spanish conquistadores refer to themselves, even in
outbursts of patriotic song, as sons of the Inca.? Though
there is much sense in the Spanish point of view, yet the
power of the appeal is evident. So thorough a student
of Spanish-American history as Clements R. Markham,
referring to the uprising of the Indians of Peru in 1780,
says, — "From the cruel death of the last of the Incas
may be dated the rise of that feeling which ended in the
expulsion of the Spaniards from South America."

This historical event is known as the rebellion of Tupac
Amaru. It will be remembered that after the Spaniards
had thoroughly established their power in Peru, they
made some slight provision for the welfare of the natives.
A school, the Colegio de San Borja, for the Christian
education of their young princes was opened in Cuzco.
But the claimants to the throne of the Incas were cruelly
treated. In 1571 the viceroy, Francisco de Toledo, second
son of the Marques de Oropesa, with the idea of stifling
any future attempt on the part of the natives to rally
around the person of an Inca, put to death on slight pre-
text the eighteen-year-old boy, Tupac Amaru, then the
acknowledged head of the royal house. But one of the
viceroy's own relatives married an Inca princess. A de-
scendant of theirs in 1770, who had been educated in the
Colegio de San Borja, successfully prosecuted his claim
to the marquisate of Oropesa before the royal audiencia
of Lima, which at the same time recognized him as the

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 47

fifth in lineal descent from the Inca Tupac Amaru. Join-
ing the prestige of this name which he assumed to that of
his Spanish title, the new Inca set to work to bring about
better conditions for the Indian population in Peru.
Having exhausted during ten years of effort all legal means
to attain his object, he stirred up the Indians to armed
resistance. Their temporarily successful revolt soon met
with defeat at the hands of the Spanish army. Not only
was the Inca captured and cruelly executed but Indians
everywhere were relentlessly hunted down. Including
their reprisals on isolated white settlers and their own
slaughter, no less than 80,000 people are said to have
perished.

The story of this dreadful affair was undoubtedly used
for political effect during the colonial struggle against
Spain. An Argentine historian, Gregorib Funes (1749-
1829) was the first to write a detailed account including
it in his Ensayo de la Historia civil de Buenos AireSy Tucu-
mdn y Paraguay. The three volumes of this history
published in 1816 and 1817 must be recognized as a schol-
ar's effort to assist the revolutionary propaganda. Like
Tacitus whom he took for a model Funes emphasized the
errors of the government and the crimes of its agents.
His story of the period preceding the revolution is brought
to a climax with the rebellion of Tupac Amaru.

In the dedication, "A la Patria," Funes says: "The
day was to arrive at last when the love of country would
not be a crime. Under the old regime thought was a slave
and the soul of the citizen did not belong to him. The
scene was changed. We are now free men. The country
demands its rights now from the beings it protects. . . .

48 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

As for me I dedicate to it the insipid fruit of this histor-
ical essay. At least it has the advantage of calling its
ravagers to judgment. . . . Moreover the tyranny and
the actions of those who have governed us will serve as
documents to enable us to discriminate between the good
and the bad and to choose the best."

Funes was bom in the town of Cordoba, where is located
the third oldest university in America. Besides attending
its courses he was educated in Spain. Before his return
to America, Carlos III appointed him a canon in the
cathedral of Cordoba, of which he later became dean.
Residing in his native town in 1810, he was one of the
first to adopt the principles of the revolution. His fellow
townsmen sent him to represent them in the first nc-itional
assembly held in Buenos Aires. For a short time after
the retirement of Mariano Moreno, Funes was editor of
the Gaceta.

It was then that the idea occurred to him of writing
his history. Despite its political purpose the work merits
serious consideration as a history of the colonial period
of the Argentine provinces. Its vigorous well-written
prose makes it a worthy first of the long series of histories
which form a leading characteristic of Argentine literature
in the nineteenth century.

The Gaceta continued to be the chief means of voicing
revolutionary aspirations, referred to collectively as the
"dogma de Mayo." After Funes' brief editorship, its
columns fulminated with the writings of Bernardo de
Monteagudo (.?-i825), one of the extraordinary person-
alities of the revolution in Spanish America. Of brilliant
mind though of humble birth he was so vehement a revolu-

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 49

tionist that he had been condemned to death and escaped
the penalty five times before 181 2. His articles in the
Gaceta preached absolute social equality and the rights
of man. To further his ideas he founded the "Sociedad
Patriotica." But his doctrines were not pleasing to the
so-called triumvirate which ruled the city, so they put a
stop to the publication of the Gaceta. Monteagudo per-
sisted in his utterances by starting a periodical of his
own, El Mdrtir 0 libre, in which his expressions were even
more violently extreme in favor of the "dogma de Mayo."
Finally he was driven from Buenos Aires. During the
years of the armed struggle he took part in the military
operations in Chile. By 1 821 he was in Peru in charge
of the department of war. Again his writings preached
liberty. Again he founded a Sociedad Patriotica to move
a people sluggish to adopt revolutionary principles. After
the final success of the revolution, Monteagudo died in
Lima by an unknown assassin's hand. His writings con-
sisting of articles and fiery speeches have been collected.
His Memorias give interesting details of his unusual
career, and a vivid picture of the times.

Contemporaneous with affairs in Argentina similar
events were taking place in Chile. The interests of these
neighboring countries have always been closely connected.
Each has served at some time as a refuge for the political
exiles of the other. And as the exiles have either been
journalists or have taken up journalism as a means of
support, their literatures have exerted a reciprocal in-
fluence.

The example of Buenos Aires in assuming the preroga-
tives of government in May, 1810, was followed in Chile

50 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

by the establishment of a similar junta to govern in the
name of Fernando VII. The date of its proclamation,
September i8th, has since been considered the national
holiday of Chile. The military situation was directed by
three brothers by the name of Carrera, who corrupted the
troops in garrison at Concepcion. The first congress
assembled in 1811. In April of that year occurred a
royalist insurrection in Santiago. During the street
fighting there appeared, encouraging the colonial soldiers,
a friar, Camilo Henriquez (1769-1825), who was destined
to be the most prominent person to support the war on the
intellectual side. In the fight he was doubly conspicuous
by reason of his garb unknown in Chile, a black gown
decorated with a red cross on the left side of the breast.
Though born a Chilean he had been sent to Peru to be
educated by the friars of La Buena Muerte, an order
which he entered. His militant action of April, Henriquez
justified in a sermon on the anniversary of North American
independence, July 4th, 181 1.

This sermon was such an able argument in favor of the
revolution that even in Buenos Aires it was ordered
printed for distribution. The mental attitude of such a
large portion of the better elements of the people, espe-
cially of the clergy, was so opposed to the revolution that
Henriquez' determined stand in favor of it possessed great
importance. As the intellectual champion of his party he
was made the editor of the periodical, the Aurora de Chile,
established as its organ. The first number appeared on
February 13th, 181 2. On July 4th, Henriquez uttered
from its columns the first cry for independence in these
words:

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 51

"Let us begin in Chile by declaring our independence.
That alone can blot out the name of rebels which tyranny
gives us. That alone can raise us to the dignity which
belongs to us, give us alliances among the powers and
impose respect on our enemies: and if we treat with them,
it will be with the majesty proper to a nation. Let us take
in short this indispensable step. Uncertainty causes our
weakness and exposes us to disorders and dangers."

On the same date at a dinner given by the consul of the
United States, Henriquez read one of the first of his com-
positions in verse, a Himno patribtico. From that time he
endeavored to persuade by similar means, celebrating each
victory over the Spanish arms by appropriate verses. In
this he was joined by a man of somewhat greater literary
ability, Bernardo de Vera y Pintado (i 780-1 827). To-
gether on the occasion of the public rejoicing at the victory
of Jose Miguel Carrera over the first army sent to Chile
by the viceroy of Peru, Henriquez and De Vera, wearing
liberty caps, sang in duet one of their original composi-
tions.

De Vera, an Argentine by birth, had come to Chile to
attend the University of Chile and had remained there as a
practicing lawyer. At the very beginning of political
unrest he had sprung into public notice because, previous
to the establishment of the junta, he had been seized by
the authorities and ordered for trial to Lima on a vessel
waiting for him in the harbor of Valparaiso. Before his
deportation, however, the revolutionary junta was estab-
lished in Santiago. The mob assailed the prison where
De Vera lay and releasing him escorted him in triumph
through the streets. De Vera was then appointed secre*

52 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

tary of the junta. He was associated also with Henriquez
in the editing of the Aurora de Chile. Throughout his
life he continued to be politically prominent. His most
important literary work was the national hymn of Chile
which he wrote in 1819. The first quatrain, expressing the
idea that Chile would be either the tomb of the free or a
refuge against oppression, was used as a refrain after each
stanza. In 1847 it was felt that the sentiments of this
hymn were too extreme and another national hymn was
adopted in its place, though De Vera's hymn may still be
heard at patriotic celebrations.

Toward the end of 18 13 the military situation began to
look black for the revolutionaries. Belgrano*s Argentine
army had been annihilated in upper Peru. A second
Spanish army sent from Lima completely worsted the
Chileans under Bernardo O'Higgins and Carrera at
Rancagua on October 12th, 18 14. A harsh period for
patriots followed this reconquest of Chile. Those who
escaped with their lives took refuge in Argentina. Henri-
quez went to Buenos Aires where he took a prominent part
in a literary movement along dramatic lines which was
going on there. O'Higgins and others joined a new
patriot army then drilling beyond the Andes.

This army was the creation of Jose de San Martin
(i 778-1 850). To his genius and hard work South America
owes its independence. The son of a captain in the Spanish
army stationed in Argentina, Jose had been taken to
Spain at the age of eight for a military education. In the
Spanish war for liberation from the domination of the
French, he distinguished himself at the battle of Bailen
and won the rank of lieutenant colonel. In 1812 he was

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 53

induced by Carlos de Alvear, likewise of Argentine birth
but belonging to a wealthy family of Buenos Aires, to
accompany him to the land of his birth. On their arrival
both assumed positions of prominence. San Martin was
given command of a regiment of cavalry which speedily
showed its mettle by beating a Spanish detachment. After
Belgrano's defeat San Martin was put in general command
of the Argentine army. He established a camp at Mendoza
on the Argentine side of the Andes in September, 18 14.
Without confiding to anybody his ultimate purpose he
succeeded in two years in collecting an army of four
thousand men thoroughly equipped with arms, provisions
and means of transport.

Early in 18 17, this army began its passage of the Andes,
a military feat which surpasses any similar thing in history.
Napoleon's crossing of the Great St. Bernard is renowned;
but this pass has an altitude of 7963 feet whereas that of
the Andes lies at 12,700 feet above the sea with a steep
descent of 10,000 feet to the plains of Chile. At such a
height both man and beast suffer from the terrible moun-
tain sickness to which many succumb. The Spanish
forces in Chile were awaiting San Martin's army but by
means of false reports he succeeded so well in keeping them
in ignorance of his intended way of approach that his
men were clear of the loftier mountains before the first
clash of arms. The main battle occurred on February 1 2th,
1 8 17, at the pass of Chacabuco. O'Higgins in command of
the Chilean contingent carried out a flanking movement so
that the result of the battle was the complete destruction
of the Spanish army. Within forty-eight hours San Martin
had entered Santiago. The dictatorship of the country.

54 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

which was offered him, was finally conferred on O'Higgins.
And the absolute independence of Chile from Spain was
proclaimed.

The next year the Spaniards made a supreme effort to
regain Chile. An army of veterans was sent from Lima.
At the first contact with the patriots at Cancha Rayada
they were victorious. But San Martin rallied the fugitives
on his reserves. On April 5th, 181 8, was fought the battle
of Maipu which terminated Spanish power in Chile.

San Martin saw, however, the danger threatening Amer-
ican independence so long as the viceroy at Lima remained
in authority. Moreover the king of Spain was collecting a
vast army at Cadiz for an attack on Buenos Aires. After
the Argentine declaration of independence at Tucuman in
1 816, the administrative control of the country had been
largely in the hands of Juan Martin de Pueyrredon, but
civil war had broken out and was paralyzing the country.
Nevertheless San Martin set to work to provide a navy and
transport ships for the purpose of assailing the viceroy in
Peru. In this effort he found invaluable assistance in
Lord Thomas Cochrane, Earl of Dundonald, an officer with
a brilliant record in the English navy but temporarily in
disgrace with the admiralty. Lord Cochrane*s fleet set
sail with the combined Chilean and Argentine army on
August 2 1st, 1820. His first exploit was a surprise attack
with small boats on the largest Spanish vessel, the forty-
four gun frigate, " Esmeralda." His boarding party cut
her out at night from beneath the very guns of the forts
at Callao and added her to his own fleet. The army was
landed from the transports and, with but little fighting
because the Spaniards withdrew into the mountains.

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 55

entered Lima. San Martin organized a civil government
and the independence of Peru was proclaimed on July 28th,
1821.

The Spanish army under the viceroy Jose de la Serna,
some twenty thousand men, had not however been dis-
posed of but was still capable of vigorous resistance. The
honor of accomplishing its destruction was reserved for one
whose name is even more famous in South American
annals, the Liberator, Simon Bolivar. But before dis-
cussing his military career it will be advisable to consider
the echoes in literature of these stirring events.

The only Peruvian poet whose name was connected
with the revolution was Mariano Melgai (1791-1815),
and he was not of Lima but of the provincial capital
Arequipa. He was a teacher of mathematics in the local
university and joined the corps of artillery among other
Spaniards who associated themselves with an uprising
of the Indian population under the cacique Pumacagua
in 1 8 13. General Ramirez operating under the orders of
General Joaquin de la Pezuela, at that time facing Bel-
grano's army, overcame the ill-organized patriot army
at the field of Humachiri. Pumacagua was hanged and
the white officers including Melgar were shot. After the
poet's death his papers were entrusted by his sister to a
priest who piously destroyed the poems which he thought
of seditious character. One of Melgar*s political poems
somehow preserved shows the vigor of the young man's
mind. The lines depict the colossus of despotism falling
beneath the blows of liberty to the amazement of man-
kind. His non-political poems reveal the delicacy of feel-
ing of a real poet. They are mainly imitations of popular

56 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

poetry described by the native word "yaravi," a sort of
plaintive love song not dissimilar in form from the Spanish
letrilla. Many later poets have tried their hand at writing
"yaravies.'* In honor of their patriot poet the citizens
of Arequipa celebrated the centenary of his birth by erect-
ing a statue of him in the public square.

In Lima the revolution found but few sympathizers.
Consequently the literature shows rather the loyalist
phase of the situation. The University of San Marcos
for example published the poems and speeches delivered
upon the occasion of General Pezuela's accession to the
viceroy alty in 1816. The victories of the Spanish troops
at Rancagua and in Argentina over Belgrano had their
panegyrists. But life in Lima flowed on with all its colo-
nial nonchalance so that the most characteristic literary
productions were the festive verses of an easy-going priest,
Jose Joaquin de Larriva (1780-183 2), and his burlesque
epic, La Angulada. With equal facility he could preach
a sermon in praise of Pezuela in 18 16 and eulogize Bolivar
in 1826. Other versifiers too there were who maintained
the traditional Peruvian love of jest.

The serious business of the revolution on the other hand
continued to occupy all minds in Buenos Aires. A pro-
lific versifier of political events was Fray Cayetano Rod-
riguez (1761-1823). His lines, though badly written, at
times incarnate the spirit of the revolution of May. Two
sonnets of his, Al 25 de Mayo, and a national hymn re-
tained for a long time their popularity because they ex-
pressed a warm enthusiasm for liberty and a love of coun-
try. He was one of the first to improvise on the victory of
Chacabuco when the news of it reached the city.

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 57

But the poet of greatest merit to follow in his verses
the course of war was Esteban de Luca (i 786-1 824).
His odes A Chacabuco, Al Triunfo del Vice Almirante
Lord Cochrane, Canto Lirico a la Libertad de Lima, all
brought him praise. The last was especially rewarded
by a gift of books presented by the government. Some-
what different was his Al Pueblo de Buenos Aires, in which
he exhorted the citizens to leave the town and devote their
time to agriculture and the raising of cattle and horses.
Beside being a poet Luca was an expert mathematician
and metallurgist. As such he served his country in direct-
ing the cannon foundry which provided Argentina with
artillery. He lost his life in a shipwreck in the Rio de
la Plata. This circumstance is commemorated by the
greatest of Argentine poets, Andrade, in his Arpa per-
dida, of which the last stanza feigns that travelers
may hear on quiet nights the sound of the forgotten
poet's lyre.

The practice of writing patriotic poems was fostered
by the custom prevailing in Buenos Aires of reciting them
at evening parties. Two collections were printed, La
Lira argentina, 1821, and Poesias patribticas, 1822, the
second by order of the government. The first includes
compositions written during the English invasion, un-
fortunately without names of the authors. More useful
to the student of literature is a collection printed in the
Revista de Derecho, Historia y Letras, in 1898 and the
following years with the title Cancionero popular. A
characteristic of style, common to all the poems, a sup-
posed embellishment^ but to modem taste a grave dis-
figurement, is the introduction of classical allusions or a

58 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

mythological machinery, Greek gods in South America,
a last sigh of Gongorism.

The mythological machinery was even more in evidence
in plays of the period. The desire for dramatic enter-
tainment excited by the recitation of patriotic verses was
satisfied by the organization of a society, "La Sociedad
del Buen Gusto," for the purpose of fostering the drama.
The first meeting was held in July, 1817. Among the
twenty-eight members were Lopez y Planes, De I^uca,
and the Chilean refugee Camilojienriquez. Colonel Juan
Ramon Rojas was the managing director. The plays
produced were either originals by the members of the
society or translations from French or English because
the director pushed his patriotism to the extreme of re-
fusing to admit to the stage plays written by Spaniards.
Rojas himself wrote the first drama given, Cornelia Beror-
quia, a tragedy of a young innocent girl condemned by
the full tribunal of the inquisition. The scandal in Buenos
Aires was tremendous. One lady who attended when
asked about the play, said, — "To-night we cannot doubt
that San Martin has passed the Andes and triumphed
over the Spaniards in Chile."

Camilo Henriquez contributed his Camila 0 la patriota
de Sud America. As this play was printed in a little vol-
ume, now a bibliographical rarity, it is possible to learn
much about the sentiments and ideas of the period. The
action of the drama takes place on the banks of the river
Marafion a few months after the slaughter of the patriots
of Quito. A family has fallen into the hands of an Indian
chief who declares that the daughter Camila must become
the bride of his prime minister. Camila objects because

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 59

she holds dear the memory of her husband Diego, one
of the patriots fallen as she supposes by the hand of Span-
ish murderers. The cacique insists on the marriage.
When the so-called prime minister is presented, the whole
affair proves to be a huge joke for the prime minister is
no other than Diego. The chief purpose of the drama is
to serve as a vehicle for Henriquez' ideas on education
and tolerance in religion. He praises the Lancaster method
of instruction as obviously advantageous. He lauds the
industry and righteousness of the Quakers though "the
burners hate them and would like to bum them all; per-
verse men have made the king of Spain believe that the
burners are the pillars of his throne." A paper which
the cacique hands his prime minister contains Henriquez*
own program for the welfare of South America. "First:
to remedy the depopulation of America and its backward
condition in arts and agriculture, it is necessary to attract
immigration by impartial, tolerant and paternal laws.
Second: if America does not forget its Spanish prejudices
and adopt more liberal principles, it will never escape
from the rule of a Spain beyond the seas, wretched and
obscure as European Spain."

Henriquez* tolerant religious principles were to bring
him the wrath of the clerical party after his return to
Chile. When his friends Bernardo O'Higgins and De
Vera became influential, the one dictator, the other his
secretary, they started a movement to invite Henriquez
to Chile raising funds for his repatriation by popular
subscription. There came with him Juan Crisostomo
Lafinur (i 797-1 824) who had been an intimate friend and
acquaintance of his in Buenos Aires. Together they

6o LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

immediately began in the press the propaganda of their
liberal ideas. But their attempts at reform came to
naught for they met violent opposition from the clergy.
The latter were fortuitously assisted by a disastrous
earthquake, called by them an act of God, a demon-
stration of His anger at the impiety of the men encouraged
by the dictator O'Higgins.

Lafinur died during the struggle as the result of a fall
from his horse. He has a place in the history of Argentine
literature by reason of his elegies on General Belgrano at
the time of the latter's death in 1820. Though other
specimens of his verse exist the three elegies so exalt the
love of country that they keep alive the author's name.

Conditions in Buenos Aires about 1820 have been
disclosed from a unique point of view in the dialogues of
Chano y Contreras written by Bartolome Hidalgo (1787-?).
Jacinto Chano, the overseer of a cattle ranch, converses
with his friend the gaucho Ramon Contreras. The latter
reviews somewhat pessimistically the advantages gained
by the revolution. The poor still remain poor, though a
few men in power are able to "spend money like rice."
Chano says he has learned that before the law, he is the
equal of any man. "Yes," replies Contreras, "but there
are difficulties in the practice," and relates the contrast
in the punishment of a rich man guilty of a notorious
crime and that of a poor gaucho who for some trivial
offense received the limit of the law. The ironical vein
maintained in the description of certain civic events is
delightful.

Hidalgo's poems were a written imitation of the type of
improvisation popular throughout Argentina. The custom

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 6l

brought from Andalusia of ballad recitation by an adept,
or "payador," who, Hghtly strumming his guitar, begins
to improvise in eight syllabled lines a narrative of some
recent occurrence with original comments developed more
widely on the pampas than elsewhere. The first to
imitate in writing this popular poetry was J. B. Maziel
in a ballad praising the viceroy's military exploits. Be-
fore Hidalgo it was used by Juan Gualberto Godoy
(1 793-1 824) for political purposes. He kept a store
far out on the plains where he is said to have sold verses
to local payadores and published a paper El Eco de los
Andes with satirical poems in gaucho style. But Godoy*s
work remained unknown till later writers made the gaucho
type of verse one of the most original and entertaining
features of Argentine literature.

Despite the importance of the victories won in the south
by San Martin, the ultimate independence of South
America was due to the assistance which came to him
from the north. In large measure was it due also to
San Martin's noble-minded and unselfish patriotism, rare
in Spanish-American annals, which prompted him to self-
efFacement when that seemed the best course. When only
his own withdrawal from the scene of active operations
would assure the i5articipation of Bolivar and his troops
in destroying the Spanish army under \the viceroy La
Sema, the generous San Martin stood aside and even
exiled himself from America.

Simon Bolivar (i 783-1 830) was the greatest military
and political genius which the revolution in Spanish
America produced. Though a wealthy landowner, he
made common cause with the uprising in Caracas, Vene-

62 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

zuela, in April, 1810. Bolivar, Luis Lopez Mendez, and
Andres Bello were despatched as commissioners to se-
cure the sympathy and material aid of Great Britain.
Bolivar's stay was short for he returned to Venezuela to
serve in the army of General Miranda which was de-
fending the country from the Spanish forces. The latter
were successful in putting down the rebellion. Bolivar
fled while Miranda was taken prisoner and sent to Spain.
Bolivar then organized another army in Nueva Granada
and fought his way to Caracas which he entered on Au-
gust 4th, 1 8 13. The Spaniards, however, again won the
upper hand. In the bloody guerilla warfare which fol-
lowed, the patriots accomplished little for several years.
In 1 8 19, however, a foreign legion of 2000 trained soldiers,
mostly Irishmen, joined Bolivar. He learned that the
Spanish soldiers in Bogota were to march to join those
in Venezuela. By a brilliant manoeuvre, Bolivar led his
men over the windswept lofty paramo and effected a
union with the patriot army of Nueva Granada. He gave
battle to the Spaniards at Boyaca on August 7th, 18 19,
and destroyed their army. After his return to Venezuela
Bolivar brought about the passage of a law by the revolu-
tionary legislature erecting Venezuela and Nueva Granada
into the Republic of Colombia of which he was to be presi-
dent. Turning then his attention to the Spanish forces re-
maining in Venezuela, he broke them at the battle of
Carabobo, June 24th, 1821. There now remained in South
America only that Spanish army which had retreated from
Lima at the approach of San Martin's forces.

Bolivar marched south by way of Popayan. Successful
in taking Quito in June, 1822, he added that province to

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 63

»

his new Republic of Colombia. The next month there
took place in Guayaquil a famous conference lasting
three days between Bolivar and San Martin. The details
of this meeting have remained forever secret. But a
letter written a month later by San Martin to Bolivar
allows one to infer the reasons for San Martin's subse-
quent conduct. In it he says, — "My determination is
irrevocably fixed. I have called the first Congress of
Peru for the 20th of next month, and on the day after
its opening I shall sail for Chile, convinced that my pres-
ence is the only obstacle which prevents your coming to
Peru with the army under your command." San Martin
evidently foresaw a civil war unless he gave way before
Bolivar's immense personal ambition.

For two years the Spanish army avoided contact. On
August 26th, 1824, Bolivar won the great victory of
Junin. But the final surrender of the Spaniards was not
made till December 7th, after the battle of Ayacucho,
where the patriot army was commanded by Antonio
Jose de Sucre (i 793-1 830). The next summer a general
assembly of Upper Peru met and declared itself the Re-
public of Bolivia. General Sucre was elected the first
president.

Bolivar's personal fortunes took him back to Caracas
from which as his capital he attempted to administer the
Republic of Colombia. Its extent, however, was so vast
and its parts so diverse that after Bolivar's death, Sep-
tember 17th, 1830, it split up into the three republics,
Venezuela, Ecuador, and Nueva Granada. The latter
reassumed the same name Colombia in 1861.
-\ Just as Bolivar's greatest campaign against the Span**

64 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

«

iards took place in Peru, so it was reserved for a native
of a Peruvian province, now a part of Ecuador, to com-
pose the most remarkable poem written about his mili-
tary success. So excellent is the classical finish of its style
that the Spanish critic Menendez y Pelayo refers to Jose
Joaquin Olmedo (i 780-1 847) as, "one of the three or
four great Spanish-American poets, if not the first."

Bolivar requested Olmedo to write some verses in cele-
bration of the battles of Junin and Ayacucho. In the
general's correspondence is found a long letter from
Olmedo dated January 31st, 1825, in which the poet
says: — "I regret that you recommend me to sing our
last triumphs. For a long time I have been revolving
that thought in my mind. Junin came and I began my
song; I should say I began to form plans. . . . Ayacucho
came and I awoke uttering a thunder, (Olmedo here al-
ludes to the opening Hnes of his ode) but I have made
little progress. Everything I produce seems poor and
inferior to the subject, I erase, tear up, correct; and
always it is bad. I have persuaded myself that my muse
cannot measure her strength with this giant. I was
proud because I expected to make a composition which
would bear me with you to immortality but I confess
myself downcast."

Olmedo did win by his ode the immortality which he
craved. Its opening peal of thunder,

El trueno horrendo, que en fragor revienta

Y sordo retumbando se dilata

For la inflamada esfera,

Al Dios anuncia que en el cielo impera,

IS an evident paraphrase of Horace's,

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 65

Caelo tonantem credidimus lovem regnare: III, 5.
The poet then sees and describes the leaders as the battle
begins. Suddenly the sword of Bolivar appears and
eclipses all the warriors as the sun eclipses all the stars.
Darkness comes on before the victory is complete; while
the soldiers are singing hymns of triumph, a voice calls
from on high in the heavens, the voice of the Inca,
Huaina-Capac. They behold his illuminated figure as he
reveals his personality. After recapitulating the horrors
that had occurred on American soil since the conquest, he
discloses the progress of the next fight at Ayacucho, de-
scribes the place of the battle and names the patriots who
will distinguish themselves, especially the leader Sucre.

In regard to him Olmedo wrote, "Sucre is a hero, is
my friend and deserves an ode for himself; at present
enough immortality will fall to his share by being named
in an ode dedicated to Bolivar."

The Inca continues by praising the new era of peace
and prosperity that stands before, but urges on the Amer-
icans the necessity of union "in order to be free and never
conquered." He is interrupted by the virgins of the sun
who intone a hymn beseeching the continued protection
of the sun as the ancient god of Peru. On the city of
Lima the virgins make demand that she open her gates
and receive Bolivar in triumph. At the close of the song
the Inca and the virgins disappear behind a golden cloud.

As Bolivar was not himself present at the final victory
the poet was obliged to connect the two battles in a
manner that would not lessen the importance of Bolivar.
Yet the means chosen, the apparition of the Inca, has
raised a veritable critics' battle. Bolivar himself called

66 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Hualna-Capac "the hero of the poem." Bello praises
the poetical device, while Miguel A. Caro ridicules the
words of the Inca who exclaims to the assembled patriots,
"You are all my children," and his offer to Bolivar as a
reward a place in heaven at his own right hand. But
Manuel Caiiete sums up the criticisms justly. "We see
Olmedo rise to the clouds borne by inspiration and find
accents, if not superior to all, not inferior to any of our
best lyric poets, whenever he exclaims what has stirred
his heart. But he falls when he leaves the luminous
sphere of truth and sinks into the labyrinth of the arti-
ficial. The reader, however, forgets the defects of the
poem, thanks to the animation, the movement, the sublime
inspiration with which the author has succeeded in ex-
pressing and developing the idea."

The Liberator was evidently satisfied with Olmedo's
poem for he named him plenipotentiary of Peru in London,
for which city he left Guayaquil on August 5, 1825.
Canete thinks it is unjust to Olmedo to attribute his ap-
pointment entirely to the poem, because Bolivar was a
good judge of men and he needed a superior person for
the mission.

The next year Olmedo published the poem in London
and Paris, with the title La Victoria de Junin, Canto a
Bolivar, In regard to it, Olmedo wrote to Bolivar: "The
canto is being printed with great elegance. It bears
the portrait of the hero; and a medallion representing the
apparition and oracle of the Inca in the clouds. The
canto needs all these externals in order to appear decently
among foreign peoples." It is interesting to note that the
plates of the Paris edition are in color and that the por-

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD e^

trait of Bolivar which Olmedo termed "medianamente
parecido" is the one which has been most widely repro-
duced.

Olmedo's sojourn in EurOpe^as divided between Lon-
don and Paris. He thus came into close intercourse with
Andres Bello and Fernandez Madrid and his correspond-
ence with them has been preserved. The former pub-
lished in the second volume of the Repertorio Americano,
Olmedo's poem, A un amigo en el nacimiento de su primo-
genito, as well as a critical notice by himself on the Vic^
toria de Junin.

Olmedo did not, however, long remain in Europe. An
intense love for his native province of Guayaquil charac-
terized the man and greatly influenced the course of his
life. As a student he lived in Lima where he obtained the
degree of doctor of law. In 1810, he went to Spain to
represent Guayaquil in the Cortes of Cadiz and was one
of the members who refused to recognize Fernando VII
until he swore to the constitution. Returning to his own
country in 18 14 he took an active part in political affairs
and was elected to the Peruvian constitutional congress
of 1822 in which he advocated a separate establishment
for the provinces now known as Ecuador. Therein he
was an opponent of Bolivar, but the Liberator's great vic-
tories turned him into an ardent admirer. Sent to Europe
in 1825, he returned in 1828. Ecuador became a separate
republic in 1830 and Olmedo was elected its first vice-
president, an office which he soon resigned in order to
become prefect of Guayaquil as he desired to live in that
city. He continued active in politics until his death in
1847.

68 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

His poems are few in number for the reason that he
wrote only when he felt inspired and took great care in
their rhetorical finish. Amunategui enumerates four
translations and ten original compositions. Of the former
the most important is a rendering of the first three epistles
of Pope*s Essay on Man. His first original poem is a
Silva a la muerte de Maria Antonia de Borhon, princesa
de Asturias, published in Lima, 1807. The poet repre-
sents the innocent princess as an expiatory victim chosen
by God who is angry at the sins of the Spaniards. As
God accepts the sacrifice, the poet urges his avenging
angel to announce that God's wrath has been appeased
and that the English who were preparing to attack Buenos
Aires would be overthrown. As a note to this composi-
tion, Olmedo wrote: "Two months after this composi-
tion was written, ten thousand English attack the city
of Buenos Aires and are beaten and obliged to surrender
by its inhabitants.'*

His poem Mi retrato, 18 17, gives us the portrait of a
tall thin man with brown hair and eyes, a broad forehead,
a large nose of which he is proud because therein he re-
sembles the poets Virgil, Homer and Ovid, fine even teeth,
a thin beard and a face much pitted from small-pox like
the sky with the stars. His acquaintances describe him
as agreeable in character with a large fund of knowledge
which Olmedo himself ascribed to his own efforts rather
than to his schooling.

The grandiloquent rhetoric of the Victoria de Junin
was repeated in a poem which Olmedo composed in 1835
to General FloreSy Vencedor en Minarica. As sheer rhetoric
there are passages which are very fine, for example, the

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 69

spirited description of the General's horse. As the sub-
ject of the poem is the victory of a partisan chief, the
Hnes often strike the reader as bombast, especially when
the poet urges the lofty peak of Chimborazo, king of the
Andes, to bow his head because the victor passes.

Juan Jose Flores (1801-64) was not to be outdone in
compliments. He also dabbled in verse-making and be-
gins his Ocios poeticos with the line,

i Que vida tan feliz, Omero mio!

He stars Omero and explains in a footnote: "Allusion to
Olmedo, wherefore the H is suppressed."

Another poet to hail Bolivar's victories as worthy of
great renown was the Colombian Jose Fernandez Madrid
(i 784-1 830), already referred to as one of Olmedo's
friends in Europe. Some suspect that Fernandez Madrid
also owed his appointment as Colombia's minister plen-
ipotentiary in London to his laudatory verses in which
within the space of ten lines he compared Bolivar to all
the great men of antiquity. In another passage the
Peruvian Incas, raising their heads from the tomb, joy-
fully salute three times the great champion, while the
volcanoes Pichincha and Chimborazo roar with indigna-
tion at the oppressors of America. Such hyperbolical
exaggeration reveals the spirit of the times.

Fernandez Madrid played an important role in the
revolution in Colombia. A member of the first revolu-
tionary junta organized in Cartagena de las Indias, 18 10,
he became the leader of the defense when the city was
besieged by the Spaniards. He was also a member of the
united provinces of Venezuela and Nueva Granada and

TO LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

was named as their president in 1816 during the lowest
ebb of their military fortunes. Falling into the hands of
the Spanish forces, he saved his life by writing to the
Spanish general Morillo that he had accepted the pres-
idency only in the king's interest. He was ordered de-
ported to Spain but, on account of illness, he never went
beyond Havana, where he was soon set at liberty. After
Bolivar's successful campaigns, Fernandez Madrid again
became prominent in politics. As confidential agent of the
republic of Colombia he was in Parts at the time of his
appointment to be her minister in London.

In this city he published a volume of his verses, 1828,
and two dramas, Atala, based on Chateaubriand's romance
of that name, and Guatimoc. These plays are specimens of
the enthusiastic attempt at play writing which flourished
in Bogota during the revolution. Fernandez Madrid, as
a versifier on occasional topics, is fluent and amusing.
"Hail, doubly hail, him who invented the hammock,"
he cries in the refrain to some stanzas in which he sings the
advantages of that blessing to humanity. To his friend
Andres Bello, he sends some playful lines to accompany a
bottle of wine, "a dose of joy," at the baptism of the lat-
ter's infant daughter. As a patriotic poet Fernandez
Madrid obtains a certain forcefulness by the use of ep-
igrammatic balance. He sees Colombia rise from her
wounds, "majestic, full of wounds, but victorious; poor
but avenged, and independent." Though he execrates the
Spaniards for their crimes, yet he recognizes them as
brothers in blood afid urges a spiritual union between
"the Hispanic lion and the American condor."

Two other Colombians who produced patriotic verses

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 71

worthy of mention were Jose Maria de Salazar (1785-
1828) and Luis Vargas Tejada (1802-29). Salazar
first exercised his poetic talents in El Placer publico de
Santa Fe de Bogota^ a. complimentary poem to celebrate
the arrival of the viceroy in 1804. In his student days he
was one of the first to write original pieces actually pro-
duced on the stage in Bogota. His Soliloquio de Eneas
and El Sacrificio de Idomeneo materially assisted in the
movement to restore the theater in that capital. Joining
the revolutionary movement he became conspicuous as
the author of the first national hymn of Colombia. Boli-
var's victory at Boyaca called forth some stirring lines
from his pen, for which Bolivar later rewarded him by ap-
pointment as the Colombian minister in Paris.

Luis Vargas Tejada was called by his fellow country-
men their Andre Chenier on account of the violence of his
sentiments on liberty. These were expressed in tragedies
written for the stage in Bogota and especially in the tragic
monologues Caton en Utica and La Muerte de Pausanias.
The youthful poet thought to turn his fanatic politics
into action by joining a conspiracy to assassinate Bolivar.
He escaped the fate of his fellow conspirators by hiding
in a cave for fourteen months. As he died insane from this
experience a tragic interest was added to his poetical work.

Though Bolivar's exploits inspired so many patriotic
lines, yet in his own country, Venezuela, there was little
literary response to them. In fact conditions there were
distinctly unfavorable to literary enterprise. Not only
was the capital Caracas frequently the headquarters of
the Spanish army, but the war was waged with absorbing
and merciless bitterness throughout the country. Ven-

72 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

ezuela was, however, the birthplace of the greatest of all
Spanish-American literary men, Andres Bello (1781-1865).
But the scene of his activity during the revolutionary
epoch was London, far from the strife of arms.

Bello, from that viewpoint, was more largely interested
in Spanish America as a whole. After the American re-
publics had been firmly established he was invited to Chile,
where his influence on matters of education and literature
became tremendous. It seems almost as if he led the lives
of two different men. In London to the age of forty-eight
he eked out a narrow existence, always studying as though
at school. In Chile for thirty-five years more he poured
forth his accumulated wisdom for the benefit of the sons of
his adopted country. The first period of Bello's life em-
^ braced the epoch of the separation of the Spanish colonies
from Spain; the second their first efforts at the upbuilding
of new nationalities.

Largely self-taught, the course of Bello's life is fore-
shadowed by his youth. He was both a precocious child
and a constant reader. At the age of eleven he saved his
pennies to buy a cheap edition issued in parts of Calder6n*s
plays. At school he distinguished himself in Latin. He
made there the acquaintance of friends who were to assist
him in getting a start in life, especially the younger sons of
the Ustariz family, persons of wealth and culture. In their
home where they had the habit of reading poems aloud
after dinner, Bello found inspiration for his earliest verses,
certain translations or paraphrases of Latin. Urged by his
friends he undertook the study of both French and Eng-
lish. For the latter language he used as a text-book,
Locke's Essay on the Understanding.

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 73

When he left school Luis Ustariz obtained for him a
position in the government office as undersecretary. In
1808 he was appointed secretary. As it was his task to
translate the French and English letters, it fell to his lot
that same year to be the medium through which the news
of the fall of Carlos IV became known in Venezuela. He
also played a part in the events which led to the uprising in
Caracas on April 19th, 18 10. As in the other Spanish
colotiies, there was established a junta or committee to
govern ostensibly in the name of Fernando VII. The
junta sent Bello as one of three commissioners, the other
two were Luis Lopez Mendez and Simon Bolivar, to
London for the purpose of obtaining assistance for the
revolution. But they received little encouragement from
the British cabinet.

In Venezuela the revolution maintained itself until
there occurred on March 26th, 181 2, a severe earthquake
on account of which many thousand persons in Caracas
lost their lives. The royalist party, assisted by the priests
who spread the idea that this event was God*s punishment
for rebellion, successfully prosecuted a counter revolution
and restored Spanish rule. Bello was thus left stranded in
London without money. Once even he came near being
put in jail for his personal debts. Bolivar, a man of means,
left London to work on his plans for the military accom-
plishment of independence for Venezuela. But Bello
remained in London for nineteen years.

His friends aided him in finding means of support. The
Spanish language being then fashionable in London, he
obtained many private pupils. By 18 14 he considered
himself able to marry. His most influential friend at this

74 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

period was Jose Blanco White, a former Spanish priest of
Irish parentage, who had left his native Seville to settle in
London. He introduced Bello to Mr. Hamilton, Secretary
of State for India, to whose children he became tutor in
1816. Among his English friends were the philosophers
James Mill and Jeremy Bentham, and he is said to have
been employed at one time to decipher the latter's man-
uscript. From his intercourse with them, he may have
derived some of the ideas that guided his scientific studies.
During his sojourn in London, Bello was constantly
studying. First he learned to read Greek from the books
in the library of an English friend. His leisure time he
spent in the library of the British Museum. As results
\j of his study he published a modern Spanish rendering of
the Poema del Cid with accompanying notes and a study
of the Cronique de Turpin. Both of these show original
and sound critical thought. Next he made his version
of Berni's Orlando Innamorato; which Menendez y Pelayo
terms the best translation in Spanish of any long Italian
poem. Moreover, he was deeply interested in educational
questions about which he published various discussions in
the Repertorio Americano. This was Bello's contribution
edited in company with the Colombian Garcia del Rio, to
the various periodicals in Spanish which appeared in
London during the revolutionary period.

A periodical ja Spanish, El Espanol, had been founded
in London by Blanco White and conducted by him from
1810 to 1814. In 1820 the Guatemalan, A. J. de Irisarri
published a few numbers of El Censor Americano to
which Bello contributed. On his own account Bello
began, 1823, the Biblioteca Americana, which soon sus-

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 75

pended. Money to pay for such a publication even though
well received in South America was slow and difficult to
obtain.

Undaunted, however, he launched, 1826, a quarterly, El
Repertorio Americano and continued it for four numbers.
The editor's purpose is set forth in the first volume. "For
years, lovers of American civilization have desired the
publication of a periodical which would defend with the
interest of their own cause the independence and liberty
of the new states established in that new world upon the
ruins of Spanish dominion." The contents of the periodi-
cal were, however, but slightly political. They comprised
encyclopedic information on such topics as literary criti-
cism, the orthography of the Spanish language, agriculture,
science and education. Original poems formed one of its
attractive features and here were first published Olmedo's
poem. En el nacimiento de su primogenito and his transla-
tion of Horace's Ode XIV. Lib I; Garcia Goyena's Canto
a la Independencia de Guatemala; and a few poems of the
Mexican Navarrete. The opening pages of the first
number contained Bello's own masterpiece, a Silva a la
Agricultura de la Zona torrida.

Bello had conceived the idea of a vast poem-t© be^n-
titled America. Of this he wrote its introduction, Alocu-
cion a la Poesia, and the Silva just mentioned. The
latter puts him in the front rank of American poets and
admits him even in the judgment of Menendez y Pelayo
to the category of those who have most artistically manip-
ulated the Spanish language. In the former poem, which
first appeared in the Bihlioteca Americana^ Bello invites
the muses to leave Europe where an artificial culture.

76 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

based on the power of gold, reigns preeminent and where
nature is supreme and bestows on each its own peculiar
beauty which the poet describes. In the silva to the
Agricultura de la Zona torrida, Bello presents the varied
beauty of the tropics, its color, its rich perfume, the rare
products of its cultivated fields, bounded by distant snow-
capped mountains, and finally urges the possessors of
this paradise to enjoy it in peace and union.

There is a certain resemblance between the two poems;
the lists of plants and their epithets are almost identical,
and an occasional line of the earlier is repeated in the
later poem. Besides there are reminiscences of Virgil's
Georgics. While Bellows poetry therein resembles other
Spanish classicists, Menendez y Pelayo finds him the
possessor of an original note "not to be confused with any
of his contemporaries. ... He is a consummate master
of poetic diction, learnedly picturesque, laboriously pol-
ished." His picturesque originality consists in appeals to
the senses when he speaks of the "snowy fleece of the
cotton," "the white jasmins of the coffee," "the living
carmine of the flowers," epithets which seem to the critic
to give a "strange flavor both Latin and American."

Bellows diplomatic activity continued during his entire
sojourn in London. As a means of livelihood, however,
its pecuniary return was uncertain even after the revolu-
tion was successful. In 1822 he accepted appointment as
secretary for the legation of Chile, a place which he re-
signed in November, 1824, to become secretary for the
legation of Colombia. Just before accepting this position
he married his second wife, Isabella Dunn.

Though his old friend Bolivar was now president of

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD 77

Colombia, Bello still received only a meager salary in
irregular payments. He did not join the chorus of those
who wrote fulsome verses to the Liberator, a fact which
the latter probably resented, for there exists a letter
written by Bolivar from Quito in which he says of Bello :
"His coldness has kept us separated to a certain degree."

The truth may be that Bello's long residence in England,
or his intellectual pursuits had subdued his native Vene-
zuelan fire. The political odes which he wrote, Himno de
Colombia and Cancion a la Disolucion de Colombia, lacked
so much of the exaggerated rhetorical style then in vogue,
that by the advice of his friend, Fernandez Madrid, they
were not published. The same chilliness of inspiration
marks the ode, Al 18 de Septiembre, by which he signalized
his arrival in Chile.

He was invited to Chile by President Prieto in 1829,
who offered him the post of chief secretary for foreign
affairs at a good salary, and an allowance of three hundred
pounds for traveling expenses. From the day of reaching
Chile Bello became closely identified with the intellectual
movement of his adopted country, so that his career
belongs with it rather than with his native Venezuela.

As the representative Venezuelan writer of prose during
the revolutionary period, it is necessary to look to Simon
Bolivar, however strange it may seem to think of the
successful general, the Liberator, as a literary man. Yet
in his speeches and his voluminous correspondence, re-
cently edited by R. Blanco Fombona, he reveals an ener-
getic style typical of the man. His speeches to his soldiers
were apparently modeled after those of Napoleon with
whom his contemporaries so fondly compared him. A

78 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

fair example of them is the proclamation issued when he
returned to Bogota, on November 23rd, 1826: — "Colom-
bians! Five years ago I left this capital to march at the
head of the liberating army from the banks of the Cauca
to the silver-bearing heights of Potosi. A million Colom-
bians, two sister republics, have obtained independence
in the shadow of our banners. And the world of Columbus
has ceased to be Spanish. Such has been our absence."

CHAPTER III

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA

In North America the course of the revolution was
different from that on the southern continent. Of the two
principal centers, Mexico and Cuba, the former emerged
from the period as an independent repubHc, while the
latter became a refuge for royalists. Moreover the Mex-
ican revolution, unlike those occurring in South America,
did not begin in the capital but in the provinces, and in-
stead of originating with an intellectual class who fed its
fires with argument and impassioned verse, the first out-
break in Mexico was the affair of provincials, many of
them of pure Indian blood, led by a rural priest, Miguel
Hidalgo. The literary expression of events was subsequent
to them by many years. On the other hand, the greatest
revolutionary poet, Jose Maria Heredia, whose unsur-
passed verses were filled with burning inspiration and
revolt, was a Cuban. In his country there took place
nothing more than a mild conspiracy, easily suppressed,
in which the poet was himself implicated. But Heredia
during the impressionable years of youth lived and wrote
in Mexico.

During the first decade of the nineteenth century there
acted as viceroys of Mexico a succession of incompetent
men whose chief aim in governing appeared to be the rapid

79

8o LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

accumulation of personal wealth. Resentment at their
measures of taxation caused the formation of conspiracies
in various parts of the country, especially after the home
difficulties of Spain became known. One of these con-
spiracies was led by Ignacio Allende who organized military
forces in various towns assisted by the counsel and in-
fluence of Miguel Hidalgo, parish priest of the village
Dolores in the mining region of Guanajuato. Before their
preparations were completed, Allende learning that their
plans had been betrayed to the authorities, so informed
Hidalgo late one night. Undismayed, the latter replied,
"We must act at once, there is no time to lose." The
next morning, September i6th, 1810, a Sunday, Hidalgo,
instead of conducting the usual service, harangued the
men of the village from the church steps and bade them
follow him to liberty. This was the famous "Grito de
Dolores," the cry to arms, from which dates the revolution
in Mexico. The i6th of September is celebrated as the
Mexican national holiday.

Hidalgo's little band steadily increased in numbers as
they marched from village to village. A picture of Nuestra
Seiiora de Guadelupe served as a banner under which to
rally. In a week a horde of fifty thousand men, mainly
Indians, armed with improvised weapons and a few mus-
kets, had assembled. Their first objective was the city of
Guanajuato, a mining center, where in a strong warehouse
of stone, known as the "alhondiga de granaditas," was
stored bullion to the value of 3S,ooo,ooo. The place was
defended by five hundred Spanish troops. Though their
musketry caused great slaughter in the assaulting mob
crowded in the narrow streets, they were forced to yield

/
/

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 8 1

by the disparity in numbers. That night the town itself
suffered pillage and burning such as has always marked
revolutions in Mexico.

Then Hidalgo took up his march on the capital. The
viceroy Venegas hastily collected such troops as he could.
In the first encounters the royalist soldiers were defeated,
but Hidalgo, being no soldier and his army a mob, was
unable to take advantage of his successes. Instead of
advancing steadily on Mexico city, he discouraged his
forces by turning back. He occupied his time by trying
to establish an organized government. He issued proc-
lamations emancipating the slaves, restoring the land to
the Indians, and calling a congress.

The royalist troops meanwhile were put under the
command of Felix Calleja del Rey, an efficient soldier,
who for his successes was later appointed viceroy. Cal-
leja*s army came into contact with Hidalgo's mob on
January 17th, 181 1, at the bridge of Calderon, where,
favored by an extraordinary piece of luck, for the dry
grass taking fire the flames and smoke were driven into
the faces of the insurgents, Calleja completely routed the
hosts of his opponents. A month later Allende and
Hidalgo were taken prisoners, and after a formal trial were
executed.

The direction of the rebellion fell to a friend and pupil
of Hidalgo, also a priest and a younger man with a greater
capacity for leadership, Jose Maria Morelos. He kept the
field against the royalists until 1815 when he too was cap-
tured and executed. Among the exploits of these four
years, one of the most famous was the defense of the city
of Cuautla, from which after several months of siege, he

82 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

and his forces succeeded in escaping. Morelos also carried
out important plans for the organization of an insurgent
government. A national congress was assembled which
drew up a written constitution for Mexico. After Morelos'
death the insurgents became mere marauding bands which
were gradually hunted down.

In 1820 occurred in Spain the revolutionary movement
making the liberal Cortes temporarily supreme. In
Mexico the privileged classes of the city felt that the time
had come for seeking independence. As military leader
was selected Agustin de Iturbide. who had been one of the
most active generals in the campaign against Morelos.
Under pretense of putting down a rebel band then vigorous
under Vicente^uerrero, he left the city with a few thou-
sand soldiers which were later increased in number by
the unsuspecting viceroy. At the proper moment JLuir-
bide. divulged to his troops his real intentions in which
they acquiesced. On February 24th, 1821, he promul-
gated a manifesto, since known as the "Plan de Iguala.'*
/ It declared for the absolute independence of Mexico,
the Roman Catholic faith as the state religion, an absolute
monarchy as the form of government with a member of
the Spanish royal family for ruler, the maintenance of all
existing institutions of property and privileges, the estab-
lishment of a junta to rule until the selection of a monarch
and the support of the three guarantees of Independence,
Religion, and Unity, symbolized respectively in the na-
tional colors, green, white, and red.

This revolution was entirely aristocratic and reactionary
against the liberal tendencies at work in Spain. The
privileged classes in Mexico were afraid of interference

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 83

with their rights by the democratic Spanish Cortes which
had won the upper hand in the contest with the King
Fernando VII. Some Mexicans even proposed inviting
the King to become Emperor of Mexico.

In consequence of the origin and character of the revo-
lution, Iturbide met with Httle resistance. The garrisons
of the provincial towns joined his forces. The main body
of insurgents led by Guerrero agreed to the plan and the
whole army entered Mexico city. A little later when a
new viceroy Juan O'Donaju, sent by the Cortes, arrived,
he found no soldiers to assist him. So he signed a treaty,
for which the Cortes had given him authority, acknowledg-
ing the independence of Mexico. It is interesting to note
that in this treaty of Cordova, signed in August, 1821,
occurs the first instance of the use of the name Mexico to
designate officially the whole country which the Spaniards
from the time of its discovery had called Nueva Espafia.

For a few months Mexico was governed by the junta
presided over by Iturbide. Then in February of 1822,
the latter by a coup d'etat caused himself to be proclaimed
Emperor of Mexico. The costly magnificence with which
he set up his court and his various pretensions made him
ridiculous and distrusted. It was not long before he was
deposed and banished. The Mexican Congress estab-
lished a federal republic of which Guadelupe Victoria,
one of the leaders in Morelos' army, was elected the first
president. A sentence of death was passed on Iturbide
in case he should return to Mexico. The latter, apparently
unaware of this decree, did land there in July, 1824, and
in three days was shot without a trial.

About Iturbide and his fortunes clusters most of the

84 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

revolutionary literature. Typical is the vigorous ode
/ Al i6 de Septiembre de 1821, by Andres Quintana Roo
(1787-185 1). First it presents a picture of the Iberian
triumph over the Mexicans led by Hidalgo. His example
fires the noble soul of Morelos, but in spite of his efforts
to achieve liberty for the Mexicans, fortune reserves the
supreme glory for Iturbide, "whose name surpasses that
of the others as much as the brilliance of the moon out-
shines the numberless stars in the firmament."

Quintana Roo was a native of Yucatan and the Mexicans
have commemorated his years of service to his country
by naming a territory in that peninsula after him. In
the same way states have been named for Hidalgo, More-
los, and Guerrero. After Iturbide's fall, Quintana Roo
edited various political journals in which he expressed
in vigorous prose a high-minded position on public affairs.
Verses by the Cuban poet Heredia exist praising Quintana
Roo for daring to oppose certain arbitrary and tyrannical
acts of the government. Quintana Roo's verses are well
written for he was a student of prosody and published
critical articles concerning it.
X Another native of Yucatan, Wenceslao Alpuche
(1804-41), struck in his odes a strongly patriotic note
with almost epic intonation. His most famous one, A
Hidalgo, reviews the bloody course of Mexican history;
then after an apostrophe to liberty, Alpuche declares that
Hidalgo, like Leonidas and Washington, was inspired
by her. Realistically portraying Hidalgo's hour of death,
he urges Mexicans to look on the hero's remains as he
prophesies that from the ground fertilized by Hidalgo's
blood will spring avengers. In a similar strain Alpuche

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 85

sang the death of Morelos, in his ode Al Suplicio de Mo-
relos.

Morelos' most famous exploit, the escape from the
siege of Cuautla, was immortalized by Francisco Manuel
Sanchez de Tagle (i 782-1 847), who described it in his
poem Romance Heroico de la Salida de Morelos de Cuautla,
Being a city man Sanchez de Tagle was more especially
enthusiastic over Iturbide in whose honor he indited
several poems. In a political capacity he was associated
with that leader, for he was one of those who composed
the Declaration of Independence of the year 1821. As a
poet Sanchez de Tagle was prolific and is considered the
principal representative of classicism in Mexico. After
his death there was published by his son a volume of his
verse, mainly love lyrics and religious pieces in classical
style. One of his earliest poems in point of time consists
of verses of occasion to celebrate the erection in Mexico
of a statue of Carlos IV. The poet owed much to the
fact that he attracted the attention of the viceroy who
appointed him a professor in the university. The promi-
nence of such a man in the revolution of 1820 shows how
different was its character from that of previous revolu-
tionary efforts.

The admiration of Iturbide in its extreme form is re-
vealed in the poems of Anastasio de Ochoa y Acuiia
(i 783-1 833). His earliest writings were satiric and festive
lines and translations, especially of dramas. In 1813 was
produced his original drama Don Alfonso. The best of
his patriotic odes is El Grito de Independencia. In this
he compares Spanish tyranny to a cloud such as a shepherd
sees approaching with the destructive force of a whirl-

86 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

wind about to overwhelm his humble home. Like the
tempest are the misfortunes of Mexico where only a hand-
ful of patriots are fighting for liberty. But while Iturbide
lives there is hope, and in anticipation of his ultimate
success, the poet congratulates "the American Mars'* on
his good fortune and triumph.

But Iturbide's assumption of the crown as Emperor of
Mexico aroused indignation and denunciation such as
was expressed in the ode A Iturbide en su Coronacion by
Francisco Ortega (i 793-1 849). This ode deserves a
place as a classic invective against ambition. The poet
urges Iturbide to listen to the voice of patriotism and
turn aside from false ambition. His true glory lies in
having achieved the independence of a people and not
in occupying a throne. Ortega enjoyed the distinction
of having written an allegorical melodrama, Mexico
Libre, which was produced as a part of the official celebra-
tion of the oaths of independence on October 27th, 1821.
In allegorical style Ortega wrote much other patriotic
verse, in which Liberty assisted by Mars and Pallas favors
America while Despotism and Discord are put to rout.
In the allegorical vein Ortega's longest poem is La Venida
del Espiritu Santo, to a large extent a paraphrase of the
first book of Milton's Paradise Lost, and yet worthy to
rank among the world's religious epics. The poem deals
with the opposition of Satan and his legions to the apostles.
The chief characters are Satan and St. Paul. The first
canto consists of a review of the forces of darkness in
which Moloch is represented by Huitzilopochtli, the war
god of the ancient Mexicans to whom their bloody human
sacrifices were made. Important episodes of the poem

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 87

are the triumph of St. Stephen, the conversion of St. Paul
and the descent of the Holy Ghost upon the apostles,
an event which Satan contemplates with scornful sneers.
One writer of prose who lived during the revolutionary
period in Mexico deserves mention, Jose Joaquin Fernan-
dez de Lizardi (i 774-1 827). From 181 2 to 1826, under
the name of " El Pensador Mexicano," he was the cham-
pion pamphleteer of the revolution. In this capacity he
defended the ecclesiastics who, stimulated by the example
of Hidalgo, had supported the revolution by bearing arms.
For his bold utterances he was thrown into prison by the
viceroy Venegas in spite of that provision of the constitu-
tion of 181 2 guaranteeing the liberty of the press. How-
ever, he was soon released. Then he gave forth his ideas
upon the condition of Mexico and its needs by publishing
in 1 8 16 a picaresque novel. El Periquillo Sarniento.

This book, though written with a distinctly didactical
purpose, is still read for the amusing character of the in-
cidents. Like Gil Bias, the hero penetrates all classes of
Mexican society, examining its virtues and vices, especially
. those which its author wishes to praise or flagellate. The
title is a nickname, by explaining which the writer desires
to discourage the habit of calling names. The hero's
name Pedro had been turned by his schoolmates into
Periquillo because he was sent to school dressed in a green
jacket and yellow pantaloons, the colors of the plumage
of the common Mexican parrot; and in order to dis-
tinguish this Pedro from another, the additional title
Sarniento, derived from a malady which he suflFered, was
bestowed upon him. The practical result of his schooling
at the hands of various ignorant teachers was to make

88 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

him able to contend in sophistical argument. Beginning
then his life career, he is, by turns, novice in a monastery,
highwayman, jail-bird, barber and doctor. In the course
of his wanderings, he comes upon the corpse of a school
friend hanging by the roadside, a warning to malefactors.
The life of this friend, one of whose early adventures had
been an attempt to seduce Pedro's sister, conveys the
ordinary lesson of the bad end of the bad boy. Altogether
the Mexican critic Altamirano considers this realistic
novel to be "the most genuine representation of the
period."

The "Pensador's" political writing becomes most in-
teresting in Las Conversaciones del Payo y del Sacristan,
in which are discussed with infinite irony and delightful
jest "the advantages which have come to Mexico by the
death of Iturbide." These imaginary conversations is-
sued between August and December, 1824, introducing
various types of Mexican character and treating the
serious problems which confronted society, are essential
to any study of social conditions at that time.

Fernandez de Lizardi published two other novels. La
Quijotita y su Prima, 18 19, and Don Catrin de la Fachenda,
1825, but in these the didactical motive has gained com-
plete ascendancy for they are practically devoid of in-
cident. In the former a colonel instructs his daughter in
the moral conduct of her life; the fact that such a preach-
ment was widely read in several editions is perhaps il-
luminating in regard to the literary taste of the period.
The title of the latter has contributed an epithet used in
Mexico, to characterize the type of person represented
by Don Catrin. A shorter book than either of these is

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 89

Noches tristes, in which the writer gives personal details
of his imprisonment. Altogether "El Pensador Mexi-
cano" is a name fondly remembered by his countrymen
because it represents a typical personality of the period. 1^

While revolution was setting Spanish America aflame,
the island of Qiba became the place of refuge for loyalists.
The immigration from Santo Domingo was the first to
come. In 1795, the whole island had been ceded to the
French, and immediately thereafter the negro insurrec-
tion raging in Haiti spread to Santo Domingo. In 1801,
the negro leader Toussaint L'Ouverture captured the
capital from which many of the leading families had
already gone to Cuba. Among them were the parents of
J. M. Heredia destined to be Cuba's greatest poet.

The loyalist immigrants contributed largely to the
elements of culture in Cuba. An interest in literature
among the men of Habana had led as early as 1790 to
the establishment of a literary journal, El Papel Periodico.
As the contributions to this paper were published anony-
mously it has been somewhat difficult to know much of
their authors, but two names of poets surpassing the others
have come down to posterity, Manuel de Zequeira y
Arango (1760-1846) and Manuel Justo de Rubalcava
(1768-1805).

De Zequeira rose to relatively high rank in the Spanish v
army and commanded the garrison of the fortress of
Santa Marta in Nueva Granada when it was besieged by
the colonial army. In private life he was a studious man
whose influence and example was highly beneficial to
Cuban letters. Of his poems, written in imitation of the
classical style of the Spanish poets of the golden age, the

90 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

best is La Batalla naval de Cortes en la Laguna de Mexico:
This contains the striking description of the death of a
Spanish soldier, Pedro de la Barba, killed by the arrow of
a native. De Zequeira was also a graceful sonneteer,
but herein his work is not always distinguishable from
that of his friend De Rubalcava. So closely do their
peculiarities coincide that critics have been unable to
make certain which is the author of an admirable sonnet,
La Huston, in which all earthly glory is compared to the
fugacious glory of the dreamer. Though the sonnet has
been commonly assigned to Rubalcava, it first appeared
in the Papel Periodic o over the pen name used by De
Zequeira. The latter wrote much religious verse also in
which is apparent the influence of the Mexican poet
Navarrete.

Such was the spirit of poetical production in Cuba
during the first twenty years of the nineteenth century
until there suddenly appeared a book of verse which there-
after became the inspiration of Cuban separatists. Its
author, Jose Maria Heredia (1803-39), ^^^ been called
by a Spaniard, "the compendium and epitome of all
enmity toward Spain." But Heredia regarded himself
as a Spaniard and refers in his verses to Spain as "tender
mother." As a partisan, however, of the liberals, who
supported in 1820 the revolution led by Rafael del Riego,
he wrote burning verses against "the oppressor of Iberia,"
and called Spain stupid because she consented to oppres-
sion and to the death of Riego. Heredia's language,
however, was later applicable to the political situation
in Cuba.

Heredia, moreover, was involved in the first attempt at

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 91

insurrection in Cuba, which occurred in 1823. He was a
member of the society known as the "Soles de Bolivar,"
who plotted to obtain independence for Cuba through
the assistance of Mexico and Colombia. Such a conspiracy
of young hotheads in a society composed of loyalist ref-
ugees was predestined to failure. Besides, the relaxation
of the Spanish commercial laws, incident to the political
conditions of America, had brought great material pros-
perity to Cuba, and thereby an atmosphere not at all
favorable to revolution.

But Heredia, though bom in Cuba, had come to man-
hood in a more bracing moral environment. His father
was a government official, who had acted as chief judge
of the court in Caracas in the days when Venezuela was
trembling under the tyranny of Monteverde. The elder
Heredia felt such sympathy for the victims of official
tyranny and in his capacity as magistrate showed such
consideration for them that suspicion of complicity in
the revolution fell on his own head. He was punished
by being transferred to a lesser position in Mexico in
which country he died in 1820. Of his father the poet
wrote in a poem dedicated to his memory, "In your charge
you took my education and never to others' hands en-
trusted my tender childhood. Love for all men, fear of
God you inspired in me and hatred of atrocious tyranny."

After his father's death the young man went to Cuba
to finish his studies in law and finally settled in the city
of Matanzas as a practicing attorney. He took with him
many of the poems which were to make him famous
after their publication. Some of them probably circu-
lated in manuscript and added fuel to the fires of revolt

92 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

which broke out in 1823. For his part Heredia was con-
demned by the audiencia of Cuba to perpetual banish-
ment. He went to the United States, traveled about
there for a short time, then departed for Mexico where he
married, became a government official and lived there to
the end of his days. In 1836 he was permitted by the
Spanish authorities to return to Cuba for a brief visit of
two months, constantly harassed by annoying restrictions.
On account of the murmurs then circulating in the island
against the actions of the governor, the restrictions may
have been justifiable from the official point of view, but
in so far as they brought Heredia and his poetic utter-
ances to the notice of Cubans they were unwise. Heredia
himself was far from thinking of inciting insurrection.
Suffering from ill health apd a sort of moral dejection on
account of turbulent political conditions in Mexico, he
even gave expression to some thoughts which have been
widely published by Spaniards as a recantation of the
political beliefs which inspired his poems.

The first edition of his poems, printed in New York in
1825, contains practically all he ever wrote that people
care for. A comparison of it with the edition of Toluca,
1832, advertised to contain additional poems, shows that
the additions consist of a few occasional pieces, a phil-
osophical dissertation in verse on immortality, and a
number of translations. In Mexico he first drew attention
to himself by writing for the papers and by the production
of certain tragedies largely adaptations from French,
the Abufar of Ducis, Sila, Tiberio, and Los ultimos Ro-
manos. The tirades against tyranny which abound in
these dramas were quite to the taste of the Mexican public

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 93

and assisted materially in making the political fortune
of their author.

The New York edition has a preface in English which
cannot help exciting pathetic interest in the reader fa-
miliar with the circumstances. It is a sort of adver-
tisement designed perhaps to help along its sale, thus:
"The author has paid particular attention to the accents
to make these poems useful to Americans learning the
Spanish language. Nothing is better calculated to give
them a practical knowledge of the true pronunciation of
words than the habit of reading poetry. May they re-
ceive this little service of an exiled youth as an expres-
sion of gratitude for the asylum he has found in this happy
country."

Those poems of Heredia which are not political in char-
acter must be classed with that type of poetry more
noteworthy for its ideas than for its form. For that
reason they are susceptible of good translation into other
languages. At the same time his poems possess a sub-
jective element revealing a passionate personality that
causes some critics to compare him with Byron and other
romantic poets. But there is nothing of the romantic
pose in Heredia*s lines for his banishment had imbued
them with the note of sincerity. Heredia stands in per-
sonal touch with the elemental forces of nature in their
sublimest form. "Hurricane, hurricane, I feel thee com-
ing," he cried; or to the sun, "I love thee. Sun: thou
knowest how joyfully I greet thee, when thou appearest
at the gates of the east." To the mighty falls of Niagara
he speaks in a familiar tone, "mighty torrent, hush thy
terrifying thunder; diminish a little the darkness that

94 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

surrounds thee; let me contemplate thy serene counte-
nance and fill my soul with ardent enthusiasm/*

Heredia's poems do not contain elaborate descriptions
of nature. On the contrary he paints with a bold stroke,
intent on producing a suitable background for the ideas
which fill his soul. Take for example the poem En el
Teocalli de Cholula. The poet seated in the ancient ternple
of the Aztecs watches the sun sink behind a volcano.
Its snow-clad top seems to dissolve into a sea of gold.^
Darkness falls. The moon and the stars become visible.^
As the moon sinks behind the volcano, the shadow of the
mountain, like a colossal ghost, strides across the plain
till it envelops the poet and the whole world, though the
vast form of the volcano is still outlined against the sky.
The flight of time thus leaves no traces on this giant.
Nevertheless the poet knows that according to the law
of nature it must some day fall.

The flight of time seenled to be always present to Here-
dia's mind. The Aztec temple is now nothing but a deso-
late monument to the cruel pride of an extinct race. The
majestic waters of Niagara run "like the dark torrent
of centuries into eternity." It is such criticism of life,
though commonplace at times, that gives Heredia's
poetry a tinge of melancholy. Therein he resembles our
own poet, William Cullen Bryant. And to Bryant we
fortunately owe metrical translations of two of Heredia*s
greatest poems, the ode to the Hurricane and the ode on
Niagara to which Heredia owes the appellation bestowed
on him of "Singer of Niagara." The latter runs thus:

My lyre! Give me my lyre! My bosom feels
The glow of inspiration. O, how long

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 95

Have I been left in darkness, since this light
Last visited my brow! Niagara!
Thou with thy rushing waters dost restore
The heavenly gift that sorrow took away.

Tremendous torrent! for an instant hush
The terrors of thy voice, and cast aside
Those wide-involving shadows, that my eyes
May see the fearful beauty of thy face!
I am not all unworthy of thy sight.

For from my very boyhood have I loved, J

Shunning the meaner track of common minds.
To look on Nature in her loftier moods. ^

At the fierce rushing of the hurricane,
At the near bursting of the thunderbolt,
I have been touched with joy; and when the sea
Lashed by the wind hath rocked my bark, and showed
Its yawning caves beneath me, I have loved
Its dangers and the wrath of elements.
But never yet the madness of the sea
Hath moved me as thy grandeur moves me now.

Thou flowest on in quiet, till thy waves
Grow broken *midst the rocks; thy current then
Shoots onward like the irresistible course
Of Destiny. Ah, terribly they rage, —
The hoarse and rapid whirlpools there! My brain
Grows wild, my senses wander, as I gaze
Upon the hurrying waters, and my sight.
Vainly would follow, as toward the verge
Sweeps the wi0^ torrent. Waves innumerable
Meet there and madden, — waves innumerable
Urge on and overtake the waves before,
And disappear in thunder and in foam.

They reach, they leap the barrier, — the abyss
Swallows insatiable the sinking waves.

96 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

A thousand rainbows arch them, and woods

Are deafened with the roar. The violent shock

Shatters to vapor the descending sheets.

A cloudy whirlwind fills the gulf, and heaves

The mighty pyramid of circling mist

To heaven. The solitary hunter near

Pauses with terror in the forest shades.

What seeks my restless eye? Why are not here.
About the jaws of this abyss, the palms —
Ah, the delicious palms, — that on the plains
Of my own native Cuba spring and spread
Their thickly foliaged summits to the sun.
And, in the breathings of the ocean air,
Wave soft beneath the heaven's unspotted blue?

But no, Niagara, — thy forest pines
Are fitter coronal for thee. The palm.
The effeminate myrtle, and frail rose may grow
In gardens, and give out their fragrance there.
Unmanning him who breathes it. Thine it is
To do a nobler office. Generous minds
Behold thee, and are moved, and learn to rise
Above earth's frivolous pleasures; they partake
Thy grandeur, at the utterance of thy name.

God of all truth! in other lands I've seen
Lying philosophers, blaspheming men.
Questioners of thy mysteries, that draw
Their fellows deep into impiety;
And therefore doth my spirit seek thy face
In earth's majestic solitudes. Even here
My heart doth open all itself to thee.
In this immensity of loneliness,
I feel thy hand upon me. To my ear
The eternal thunder of the cataract brings
Thy voice, and I am humbled as I hear.

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 97

Dread torrent, that with wonder and with fear
Dost overwhelm the soul of him that looks
Upon thee, and dost bear it from itself, —
Whence hast thou thy beginning? Who supplies.
Age after age, thy unexhausted springs?
What power hath ordered, that when all thy weight
Descends into the deep, the swollen waves
Rise not and roll to overwhelm the earth ?

The Lord has opened his omnipotent hand,
Covered thy face with clouds, and given voice
To thy down-rushing waters; he hath girt
Thy terrible forehead with his radiant bow.
I see thy never-resting waters run.
And I bethink me how the tide of time
Sweeps to eternity. So pass of man —
Pass, like a noonday dream — the blossoming days
And he awakes to sorrow. I, alas!
Feel that my youth is withered, and my brow
Ploughed early with the lines of grief and care.

Never have I so deeply felt as now
The hopeless solitude, the abandonment.
The anguish of a loveless life. Alas!
How can the impassioned, the unfrozen heart
Be happy without love? I would that one
Beautiful, worthy to be loved and joined
In love with me, now shared my lonely walk
On this tremendous brink. 'Twere sweet to see
Her sweet face touched with paleness, and become
More beautiful from fear, and overspread
With a faint smile while clinging to my side.
Dreams, — dreams! I am an exile, and for me
There is no country and there is no love.

Hear, dread Niagara, my latest voice!
Yet a few years, and the cold earth shall close

98 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Over the bones of him who sings thee now
Thus feelingly. Would that this, my humble verse.
Might be, like thee, immortal! I, meanwhile.
Cheerfully passing to the appointed rest.
Might raise my radiant forehead in the clouds
To listen to the echoes of my fame.

Even in the presence of the rushing waters Heredia
yearns for love, an ever present desire with him. In the
lines on his father's death he expresses the hope of finding
consolation for his loss in "the arms of his beloved."
In the matter of his beloved it is interesting to note the
dedications of the two editions of his poems prepared
by Heredia himself. In the edition of New York the honor
of the first place is given to certain lines, "To a young
lady who used to read my verses with pleasure." In the
edition of Toluca these lines are replaced by a sonnet,
"To my Wife," thus translated by James Kennedy.

When yet was burning in my fervid veins

The fieriness of youth, with many a tear

Of grief, 'twas mine of all my feelings drear.

To pour in song the passion and the pains;

And now to thee I dedicate the strains.

My wife, when love, from youth's illusions freer.

In our pure hearts is glowing deep and clear,

And calm serene for me the daylight gains.

Thus lost on raging seas, for aid implores

Of Heaven the unhappy mariner, the mark

Of tempests bearing on him wild and dark;

And on the altars when are gained the shores.

Faithful to the deity he adores.

He consecrates the relics of his bark.

The full intensity of Heredia's temperament is revealed

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 99

in the lines to the Hurricane. For some reason Bryant
did not translate the last stanza of the poem, perhaps
because it was too intense for the Puritan in him. It has
been necessary then to add it in a prose form, because to
Heredia this stanza was the climax to the rest. Though
Bryant's translation is at times almost literal he para-
phrased the opening cry, "Hurricane, hurricane, I feel
thee coming."

Lord of the winds! I feel thee nigh,
I know thy breath in the burning sky!
And I wait, with a thrill in every vein,
For the coming of the hurricane!

And lo! on the wing of the heavy gales.
Through the boundless arch of heaven he sails;
Silent and slow, and terribly strong.
The mighty shadow is borne along.
Like the dark eternity to come;
While the world below, dismayed and dumb.
Through the calm of the thick hot atmosphere,
Looks up at its gloomy folds with fear.

They darken fast; and the golden blaze
Of the sun is quenched in the lurid haze,
And he sends through the shade a funeral ray—
A glare that is neither night nor day,
A beam that touches, with hues of death.
The clouds above and the earth beneath.
To its covert glides the silent bird,
While the hurricane's distant voice is heard
Uplifted among the mountains round.
And the forests hear and answer the sound.

He is come! he is come! do ye not behold
His ample robes on the wind unrolled ?

lOO LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Giant of air! we bid thee hail! —

How his gray skirts toss in the whirling gale;

How his huge and writhing arms are bent

To clasp the zone of the firmament.

And fold at length, in their dark embrace,

From mountain to mountain the visible space.

Darker — still darker! the whirlwinds bear
The dust of the plains to the middle air:
And hark to the crashing, long and loud.
Of the chariot of God in the thunder-cloud!
You may trace its path by the flashes that start
From the rapid wheels where'er they dart,
As the fire-bolts leap to the world below,
And flood the skies with a lurid glow.

What roar is that? — *tis the rain that breaks
In torrents away from the airy lakes.
Heavily poured on the shuddering ground,
And shedding a nameless horror round.
Ah! well-known woods, and mountains, and skies,
With the very clouds! — ye are lost to my eyes.

I seek ye vainly, and see in your place
The shadowy tempest that sweeps through space,
A whirling ocean that fills the wall
Of the crystal heaven, and buries all.
And I, cut oflF from the world, remain
Alone with the terrible hurricane.

Sublime tempest! As if filled with thy solemn inspiration,
I forget the vile and wretched world and raise my head
full of delight. Where is the coward soul that fears thy
roar? In thee I rise to the throne of the Lord; I
hear in the clouds the echo of his voice; I feel the
earth listen to him and tremble. Hot tears descend my
pale cheeks and trembling, I adore his lofty majesty.

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA ' iot

The same fiery ardor is displayed in Heredia*s political
poems. Their chief sentiments are hatred of oppression
and love of liherty. A series of sonnets on Riego, Rome,
Cato, Napoleon, all express admiration for champions of
human rights. Napoleon saved France from anarchy and
made kings tremble; though he died abandoned on a
lonely rock, his life exemplifies the fact that no oppression
however strong is irresistible. Love of liberty is ever the
poet's cry. In his earliest political composition, La Es-
trella de Cuba, written at the age of nineteen and probably
circulated in manuscript among the conspirators of 1823,
Heredia calls for sacrifice of this sort, "If the scaflFold
awaits me, upon its height my bleeding head will appear
a monument of Spanish brutality."

When banished he indited an Epistola a Emilia, a gem
of personal lyric verse. Homesick and longing for the
"terrible sun" of Cuba, he wrote from the North: "I am
free, but what cruel change! The winter's wind is roaring;
upon its wings flies the piercing cold. The inert world
suffers the tyranny of cruel winter. My ear hears not the
voices of my friends but only the barbarous sounds of a
foreign idiom. But it is not wearied by the insolent
tyrant, nor the groan of the slave nor the crack of the whip
which poisons the air of Cuba. At night when the light of
the silent moon and the delicious perfume of the lemon in-
vite to repose, a thousand thoughts of rage becloud my
mind."

The political verse attains a climax in the closing lines
of the Himno del Desterrado: "Cuba, Cuba, what life you
gave me, sweet land of light and beauty! And am I to see
thee again ? How sternly the severity of my fate weighs

ibv''* 'LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

on me to-day! Oppression threatens me with death in
the fields where I was bom. Cuba, at last thou shalt be
free and pure as the air thou breathest, as the sparkling
waves which thou dost see kissing the sand of thy shores.
Though vile traitors serve him, the tyrant's wrath is vain,
because not for naught between Cuba and Spain does the
sea roll its billows."

Heredia's prophecy of September, 1825, was not fulfilled
for nearly three-quarters of a century, but during that
period his poems were a constant inspiration to Cuban
patriotism. To this fact even the Spanish critic Menendez
y Pelayo testifies with bitterness in these words, "If his
political activity does not equal that of other conspirators
against Spain, because he took no part in an armed strug-
gle, his literary influence was continuous and more eflPectual
than any other because he surpassed all in talent."

As there is in Heredia something typical of Spanish
Americans, his vague sensuality, his melancholia, his out-
bursts of hatred, his love of liberty, his poetry is doubly
interesting. The ease with which he was able to express
these different emotions made him indifferent at times to a
classical finish in the form of his verse. In this he belonged
to the romantic school. For an exact and comprehensive
criticism of Heredia nobody has ever excelled that of the
Spanish critic, Alberto Lista, who said after reading the
first edition of his poems, "He is a great poet; the fire of
his soul has passed into his verses and is transmitted to his
readers."

Heredia must be classed with the revolutionary epoch
though he stands alone among Cubans of that day. The
Cuban struggle for independence was to fill the whole of

THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD IN NORTH AMERICA 103

the nineteenth century and therefore the whole of Cuban
literature may be called revolutionary. On the other
hand, in other Spanish-American countries the winning
of independence was followed by a period of adjustment
to new political conditions. As this adjustment varied
with local conditions there sprang up local literatures
which must be studied separately.

CHAPTER IV

ARGENTINA

After separation from Spain the vast territory of the
Argentine Republic, divided politically into provinces,
was organized into a nationality by Bernardo Rivadavia.
Under his dictatorship Buenos Aires became the capital
of a centralized or unitarian republic. Against the suprem-
acy of the city the provinces demanded a federal republic
and rose in rebellion, fighting even among themselves.
Moreover, it became necessary to assert Argentine sov-
ereignty over the frontier province, now the independent
republic of Uruguay, against the aggressions of the Por-
tuguese from Brazil. The Uruguayans opposed an armed
resistance to the claims of the Brazilians and were assisted
by forces sent out from Buenos Aires. In the final battle
at Ituzaingo, on February 20, 1827, the Brazilians were
so decisively beaten that the question of sovereignty was
settled, while a treaty between Argentina and Uruguay
the next year conceded absolute independence to the latter.

An ode in celebration of this battle, Al Triunfo de Itu-
zaingo, is one of the best lyrical pieces of the Argentine
poet Juan Cruz Varela (1794- 183 9). It is a long poem,
relating rather minutely the course of the fight. In this
respect it resembles the ballad chronicles which were in-
spired by the political events in Buenos Aires from the
time of the bombardment of the city by the English. But

104

ARGENTINA 105

there is a swing to these verses of Varela's which puts him
poetically above his fellow balladists. Varela was not
only a journalistic champion of Rivadavia's administra-
tion but the poetic chronicler of all the occurrences of it,
writing odes on the foundation of the university, on the
hydraulic works ordered by the government, on the estab-
lishment of the philharmonic society. In spite of the
apparent dullness of such topics Varela infused them with
life. Especially praised is an ode on the liberty of the press,
for Varela was a fierce patriot. His fierceness reaches a
climax in an ode, Al Incendio de Cangallo. This was a
Peruvian village burned and razed by the Spaniards in
1822, an act which roused great indignation and is still
commemorated by the name of a street in Buenos Aires.
Varela called for "vengeance, pitiless vengeance, on the
Iberian tigers, the proud Spaniards, hateful race of the
execrated Attila." Such invective was as much to the lik-
ing of the author's contemporaries as it is unpleasant to
the Spaniards to-day.

The same hyperbolical and declamatory rhetoric made
popular two dramas by Varela, Dido, and Jrgia, written
for production before the Sociedad del Buen Gusto in
Buenos Aires. These were in some respects the most
original dramas produced through the influence of that
society for the promotion of the drama. In 1823 the
tirades in Dido created enthusiasm for their apt references
to the political situation. The same was true of Argia
a year later. This play was based on Alfieri's Antigone,
while Dido sometimes followed Virgil word for word. In
his later years Varela made a metrical version of the
Aeneid though only the first two books of the epic were

lo6 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

ever printed. Juan Cruz Varela deserves credit for his
efforts in classic culture during the troublous times in which
he lived.

The unitarian party to which Varela belonged was forced
out of power and beaten in battle by the federalists under
the leadership of Juan Manuel Rosas. This man, sup-
ported by the gauchos of the interior, finally succeeded in
assuming absolute power. To his political opponents he
was merciless. Calling them savages and confiscating
their property for the benefit of his adherents, he organized
a special body of police called the "Mazhorca" to hunt
down and exterminate all unitarians. Many of those who
escaped from his clutches into exile, since they were ed-
ucated men, took up the fight against Rosas with pen as
well as sword. For that reason Argentine literature until
the latter*s fall in ^^^2 is to a large extent a militant
protest against that tyrant. Juan Cruz Varela*s last
poem, for example, rhetorically one of his best, Al 25 de
Mayo de 18 j8, was directed against Rosas.

Before the worst days of Rosas' control there occurred
an event of the first magnitude in the history of Spanish-
American letters, the introduction of romanticism through
the publication of Esteban Echeverria's poem Elvira in
1832. This date is noteworthy because it is the same
year m which appeared the Duque de Rivas' Moro esposito,
the first important production of Spanish rorhanticism.
Argentina thus received directly the French type of roman-
ticism whereas other countries absorbed the romantic spirit
at second hand through the medium of Spanish works.

Nature in Argentina was to offer a fertile field for ex-
ploitation by romantic poets. Contemporary with Eche-

ARGENTINA 107

verria but dying too young to fulfill the promise of his
early work was Florencio Balcarce (1815-39). His memory
is kept alive by certain pieces through their evocation of
national scenery and life. The song of the milkman,
El Lecheroy is fresh and natural. El Cigarro evoked the
memory of the national hero San Martin then living in
semi-exile in Europe. The poem depicts an old man
smoking a cigar beneath the shade of an ombu tree. Phil-
osophizing to his grandchildren, he finds that fame is like
the ashes of his cigar, that old men are cast aside and
despised like the butt of a cigar. There is something of
the romantic spirit in Balcarce's poems and had he lived
longer he might have been one of the ablest of Echever-
ria's disciples.
y^ Esteban Echeverria (1805-51) at the age of twenty,
went to Europe in search of educational advantages not
to be found then in his native land. The study of literature
appears to have been his chief occupation, the works of
Shakespeare, Goethe and especially Byron. When in
Bordeaux, a Swiss friend took him to see a representation
of Schiller's Kabale und Liehe, which made a profound
impression on his mind. Before his return to Buenos
Aires, his interest in Byron's poetry led him to make a
short visit to England in 1829. He arrived in Argentina,
May, 1830. Warmly received there, he published a few
gratulatory verses and then withdrew from public inter-
course to work on a poem which was published in 1832,
entitled Elvira 0 la novia del Plata. The public was too
violently agitated by politics to give much attention to
this production, but his next volume of verse, Los Con-
sueloSy made their author immediately popular.

Io8 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Los Consuelos are short poems in the Byronic manner.
The romantic pose maintained throughout the collection
was new to readers in Argentina and delighted them.
The author explains the title by the words: "They solaced
my grief and have been my only consolation in days of
bitterness." The practice which he adopted from Byron
of heading each poem by a quotation gives an excellent
clue to their contents and character. For the entire col-
lection he chose two lines from Auzias March which, after
quoting in the original Catalan, he gave in the Spanish
of Luis de Leon :

Let no one see my writings who is not sad, or who at some
time has not been sad. ^^

From Byron he selected.

Fare thee well ! and if forever,
Still forever, fare thee well!

to head the poem entitled Lara o la Partida. The name
Lara was the poet's romantic disguise. Taken boldly
from Byron, it expressed the loneliness of heart that
characterized the original of the English poem. As Eche-
verria was hurt by the indifference of the public towards
his first volume, he withdrew from Buenos Aires to the
little village of Mercedes on the Rio Negro. The poem
Lara voices his adieu. After describing the departure
of the vessel, the poet is moved to sing because he "re-
members the injuries of fate," he calls on hope and bids
good-by to love, but as his tears choke him, he is forced
to desist. The most original poem of the collection is,
El y Ellay a love dialogue which especially delighted the
young ladies of Buenos Aires. The form of this poem

ARGENTINA 109

departs from all classic standards as the strophes vary
in length from twenty-four lines to a single line of passion-
ate utterance. The volume also contained several pa-
triotic appeals which expressed the feelings of the public
at the moment and helped to arouse enthusiasm.

The success of this volume encouraged Echeverria to
bring out in 1837, Las Rimas. Besides short pieces it
contained a long poem, La Cautiva, which put into prac-
tice a doctrine previously expressed by the author, in a
note to Los Consuelos. Poetry, he declared, does not
enjoy in America the influence which it possesses in
Europe. "If it wishes to gain influence, it must have an
original character of its own, reflecting the colors of the
physical nature which surrounds us and be the most
elevated expression of our predominant ideas and of the
sentiments and passions which spring from the shock of
our social interests^Only thus, free from the bonds of
all foreign influence, will our poetry come to be as sub-
lime as the Andes; strange, beautiful and varied as the
fertile earth, which produces it.'*

As a preface to La Cautiva, he wrote: "The main pur-
pose of the author has been to paint a few outlines of the
poetical character of the desert; and in order not to reduce
his work to a mere description, he has placed in the vast
solitude of the pampa two ideal beings, or two souls
united by the double bond of love and misfortune. The
desert is our richest patrimony and we ought to try and
draw from its breast not only wealth for our well-being,
but also poetry for our moral pleasure and the encourage-
ment of our literature." Thus Echeverria first expressed
a doctrine which Spanish Americans have generally felt

no LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

to be true and according to which, consciously or other-
wise, they have produced in literature, whatever is really
valuable.

The first scene of La Cautiva is laid in the camp of a
band of Indians after their raid on a village of whites.
Exhausted by their exertions and the drunken orgies of
celebration, the savages fall asleep. The silence of the
Argentine pampa creeps upon them and their captives.
Most important of these is Brian, formerly a scourge of
the Indians, now bound between two lances awaiting
death by torture. His wife Maria, however, is not bound;
for upon her the Indian cacique, Loucoi, had cast lustful
glances. When sleep furnishes the opportunity, Maria
plunges a dagger into Loucoi's heart. In the same way
marking a bloody path through the band of sleeping
savages, she reaches the spot where her husband is bound,
cuts him loose and together they escape. But they are
hardly gone before a band of horsemen surprise the camp,
slay the Indians and free the captives; though to their
sorrow, the rescuers are unable to find Brian and his
wife. In the meantime the latter are straining limbs and
nerves to put a great distance between them and their
former captors. Brian, however, travels with difficulty
on account of his wounds. As they are resting, they see
a cloud of smoke swiftly approaching. The pampa is
afire. Brian, scarcely able to stir, begs his wife to save
herself; but she sturdily places her husband on her back,
makes her way to the neighboring river, and swims to
safety on the opposite bank. Such heroism, nevertheless,
is vain for on the following day Brian is attacked by
fever and die^ Maria sets out alone to cross the pampa.

ARGENTINA III

and soon meets a detachment of soldiers, who were search-
ing for her and Brian. Of them she inquires deliriously
for her son and though she herself had related his murder
to her husband, she expires when the soldiers tell her
that her son had been killed.

The literary significance of La Cautiva lies in its revolu-
tionary departure in form from the classic Spanish ideal
and the author's success in carrying out his purpose.
The Argentine critic, J. M. Gutierrez, writes that "La
Cautiva is a masterpiece, whose perspectives give the
most complete idea of the sunburnt immensity of the
pampa."

Echeverria, taking advantage of the prestige which
his verses had brought him, plunged boldly into politics
by launching a sort of secret society, "La Asociacion de
Mayo," in June, 1837, which had for its object to bring
about the fall of Rosas. The main principles of the society
were expounded by Echeverria in a pamphlet entitled
El Dogma socialista. Despite the name the tone of the
ideas was not sd much socialistic as democratic after the
manner of contemporary French writings.

When news of this secret society reached Rosas* ears,
the dictator lost little time in sending his agents to sup-
press it. Echeverria took refuge in the country at some
distance from the city. Then occurred a rising against
Rosas among the landed proprietors in the south of the
province of Buenos Aires. Being few in number they
could not long withstand his soldiers though those who
escaped after the battle which they fought took ship for
Montevideo where they joined the forces of General
Lavalle. The heroism of the unequal conflict inspired

112 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Echeverria to compose a poem La Insurreccion del sud
de la Provincia de Buenos Aires en i8jg. The poem is
merely a rhymed chronicle of events. Whatever embel-
lishments the author may have intended to make had to
be omitted because he left the manuscript behind when
the approach of Rosas' men caused his hasty flight. It
was ten years before the manuscript was recovered and
the poem published. Echeverria's second place of refuge
was Montevideo.

In that city he was merely one of many refugees. As
he suflFered severely from an aflFection of the heart he was
unable to take physical part in the armies that set out
against Rosas. Moreover, he appeared to his fellows as a
visionary. His pen, however, was not idle. Among his
first poems were two of patriotic character published under
/ the title of Cantos a Mayo. Then borrowing from Byron's
^ Parisina the principal episode, that of the wronged hus-

band who learns from his wife's lips as she talks in her
sleep the story of her adultery and nevertheless flees from
the room without carrying into effect his impulse to kill,
Echeverria adapted it to an Argentine environment.
First called La Guitarra, the poem was afterwards named
from the guilty lady Celia, A very long continuation
or sequel of this poem in eleven cantos and eleven thousand
lines was published after the poet's death with the title
El Angel caido. Its literary value is correctly characterized
by Menendez y Pelayo thus: — "It is not the fall of an
angel but the fall of a poet." The theme is a presentation
of Don Juan in Argentine society, but he is not a person
for he has become an abstraction expressing the author's
moral and political ideas.

ARGENTINA 1 13

Better and more interesting at least in its descriptive
part is another long poem, Avellaneda, intended to cele-
brate the heroism of a man by that name who died in the
struggle against Rosas. The scene is laid in the province
of Tucuman. In depicting its natural beauties Echeverria
again demonstrated his principles concerning the Ameri-
canization of literature. The political element of the
poem is of course less attractive.

These two peculiarities dominate all Argentine litera-
ture, and as Echeverria put them forth as a sort of theory
of aesthetics, it may be said that his influence has pre-
vailed during most of the century. The Americanization
of literature which he advocated in a note to the Cautiva
had a long and varied development in Argentina and
found in other countries at the advent of naturalism a
responsive echo. And his conception of poetry as a moral
or civilizing agent became the literary creed of later
romanticists.

The Argentines who fled from the tyranny of Rosas
may be roughly divided into two groups, those who found
refuge in Chile and those who preferred Montevideo.
The story of the literary activities of the former in Chile
on account of their undeniable influence in that country
belongs with the history of Chilean literature. The
exiles had to earn a precarious living by their pens, but
they were personally more secure than their compatriots
in Uruguay. The latter remained in the thick of the fight
where a sudden shift of fortune would have thrown them
into Rosas' hands. For nine years his army and fleet
maintained a siege of Montevideo from 1841 to 1850.
In the latter year General Urquiza deserting the tyrant

114 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

brought his forces to join the league against him. In
1852 occurred the battle of Monte Caseros which termi-
nated Rosas' power.

During the period of the great siege Montevideo was
the center of Argentine letters, and their main theme
anathema of Rosas. The foremost wielder of political
X invective was Jose Marmol (1818-81). At the age of
twenty he found himself in prison as a conspirator. On
the walls of his cell he scribbled in a quatrain his first
denunciation of the tyrant in which he declared that the
"barbarian" could never put shackles on his mind. The
quatrain became MarmoFs favorite vehicle of expression
for his passionate hate. The sincerity, the variety, and
the intensity of his quatrains rendered them famous.
Making Rosas second only to Satan in his capacity for
evil, they depict him more bloodstained than Attila or
Nero, bloodguiltier than the Atridae, bloodthirstier than
a ravening tiger.

For the class of readers that prefer facts to objurgation
Marmol prepared Amalia, in form supposedly a historical
novel after the manner of Walter Scottj, but more exactly
a detailed account of Rosas' crimes so presented as to
show the moral degradation of Buenos Aires. Many
episodes are introduced solely for this purpose. For
example, Rosas demonstrates to the crowd his democratic
ideals by compelling his daughter to receive the kisses of
a rum-crazed negro. The description of the state ball
gives an opportunity to reveal the character of the persons
who form Rosas' immediate entourage, their base flattery,
the vulgar conversation of the ladies. The narrative
part of the story concerns principally the acts of a Daniel

ARGENTINA II5

Bello, himself opposed to Rosas but protected in his
operations because he is the son of one of Rosas* adherents.
Though carrying on various intrigues and acting as a spy
for those who are plotting in Montevideo for an uprising,
Daniel remains unsuspected. When his friend Eduardo
Belgrano ventures into Buenos Aires on a mission, Daniel
is able to save his life even after Eduardo has been severely
wounded and left for dead by the police by concealing
him in Amalia's house. She is Daniel's cousin. She takes
so much interest in the patient that she falls in love with
him. The book ends with a description of their wedding
night. Its festivities are interrupted by the police who
break in for the purpose of arresting Eduardo and who
kill him.

The novel Amalia met with a large sale in Europe.
Menendez y Pelayo explains this fact in his criticism.
After pointing out that the story is so strange as to be
unreal, that one involuntarily asks how such a social
condition could endure so long, he says, "The interest of
the narration is very great and one drops the book re-
luctantly."

Marmol further utilized his experiences and sensations
as an exile in composing a long poem, El Peregrino. It is
not complete, but many of the fragments possess great
lyrical beauty. The main idea of the poem is that of a .
Childe Harold in South America. With descriptive pas-
sages concerning the clouds, the tropical sunset, the
beauties of America, Marmol mingles the expression of
his feelings, his love for his wife, his religious faith, his
grief at the condition of his native land, the joy of loving
even in the midst of grief.

Ii6 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

The drama also tempted Marmol. Little praise is
accorded, however, to the two dramas which he wrote.
El Cruzado and El Poeta. The latter deals with the love
affairs of Carlos and Maria. Carlos, being a poet, is
poor and therefore turned away from Maria by her father.
Nevertheless the lovers continue to communicate even
after Carlos is thrown into prison for writing political
articles against the government. When Maria learns
that Carlos is to be exiled, she prevails on her father to
use his influence to secure the poet's release. In return
she promises to marry Don Enrique. The fifth act of
the play opens with the wedding ceremony. After the
vows have been pronounced, Carlos appears at the house
and gains entrance to Maria's room, where he succeeds
in calling her for an interview. Reproached by her lover
for inconstancy, she tells him that she has taken poison.
Then Carlos obtains some of the same poison and swallows
it. She dies in his embrace, but Carlos lives long enough
to hurl curses at the unhappy father.

Another Argentine exile and knight of the pen in the
7^ struggle against Rosas was Jose Rivera Indarte (1814-45).
At the early age of twenty-one, he suffered incarceration
for the expression of his opinions. While in prison the
reading of the Bible and Dante determined the style of
his poems which he began to write then. After his release
he took ship for North America. During the voyage he
fell sick with an attack of smallpox. Being isolated and
neglected, it was a marvel that he lived to reach Salem,
Massachusetts. When news came to him of the emigra-
tion of his friends to Montevideo he set sail for that port
where he began to write for El Nacional. His attack on

ARGENTINA 1 17

Rosas developed the thesis that it would be a saintly
action to kill the tyrant. His articles being largely de-
scriptive of cruel deeds were published in book form under
the title Rosas y sus Opositores and had great influence
in shaping foreign public opinion. His poems, published
after his untimely death, from consumption contracted
during the shattered state of his health, contain some
political satires in the style of Marmol but without the
latter's force. His patriotic hymns of the Argentine emi-
grants and to Lavalle are more convincing. In his ode
on the battle of Caaguazu he introduced an apparition of
General Belgrano similar to the apparition of the Inca
in Olmedo's famous ode. But many of his poems are
Biblical paraphrases or imitations collected under the
title of Melodias hebraicas, which, however, are rather
prosaic without poetic fire.

Far better as poetry were the verses of Claudio Mamerto
Cuenca (1812-52), killed at the battle of Monte-Caseros
where Rosas was overthrown. He was a surgeon whom
circumstances had compelled to remain in Buenos Aires
as well as later to serve with the tyrant's army. His
reputation among the patriots, however, was saved by
the verses penned before the battle and found on his
body. After bitter denunciation they declared that the
hour of Rosas' purging had arrived. Cuenca's literary
remains were published in three volumes under the title
of Delirios del Corazbn. Beside many lyrical pieces of
considerable inspiration he was the author of Don Tadeo,
a comedy of manners in five acts and a drama, Muza.

In the army that defeated Rosas there commanded the
artillery a young man of thirty, Bartolome Mitre (i82l-^)<;^

Il8 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

1906), who afterwards proved himself to possess one of
the strongest and sanest intellects in Argentina. A cap-
tain at the age of seventeen in the first siege of Monte-
video, he rose rapidly in rank. The year 1848, however,
found him in Chile where he showed that he could wield
a pen as well as a sword by editing the Mercurio de Val-
paraiso. Among his companions in Montevideo he was
known also as a poet.

What Echeverria said of Mitre's verses in 1846 is
interesting: "His muse is distinguished among his con-
temporaries by the manly frankness of his sentiments
and a certain martial quality." Now listen to Mitre's
own comment when editing his poems in later days: "I
love my verses because they reflect some of those intense
sorrows and some of those solemn moments of the revolu-
tion against the tyrant Rosas. I have another reason
for hating Rosas and the publication of these rhymes is
my revenge. On account of him I have had to bear arms,
travel the country, become a politician, and plunge into
the stormy course of revolutions without being able to
follow my literary vocation."

Mitre's poems were nearly all written before 1846.
They possess high literary and lyrical qualities. In the
elegies on the deaths of certain individuals, as General
Lavalle, who had fallen in the civil war, there is a display
of real feeling which surpasses that of his contemporaries.
One of his anti-Rosas pieces became a popular song. The
title Invdlido refers to the old veteran who recites the
story of his services to the country before begging "una
limosna por Dios." The last stanza is the poet's own
plaint in this wise:

ARGENTINA II9

La Republica Argentina
Bajo el yugo de un tirano
Pide al mundo americano
Una limosna por Dios!

One section of Mitre's Rimas is devoted to Armontas
de la Pampa. Therein he shows himself a disciple of
Echeverria by seeking inspiration in nature, or national
customs. El Ombu en medio de la Pampa reveals a rare
love for trees. El Pato describes a gaucho game by that
name. In fact he is one of the first to attempt a poetical
treatment of the Argentine gaucho by telling the legend
of the famous Santos Vega. Again he sings El Cab alio del
Gaucho with all the enthusiasm and love for horses which
he himself undoubtedly felt.

His reason for ceasing to write poems is interesting.
He says: "At twenty years of age, I dreamed of immortal
renown; the laurels of Homer robbed me of sleep. Soon
I understood that I could not even aspire to live in the
memory of more than one generation as a poet nor was
our society sufficiently mature to produce a poet laureate."

Politics occupied Mitre after the return to Buenos
Aires. In the fight of the city against the confederation
in 1 861, he led the city's military forces. Being successful
he was proclaimed dictator of the new federation of which
Buenos Aires became the undisputed seat of the govern-
ment. To his wisdom and moderation was due the fact
that the old bitter differences between the city and the
provinces lapsed to the point of disappearance. In 1865
he led the Argentine forces in the war against Solano
Lopez, dictator of Paraguay. In 1868 his term as presi-
dent came to an end, and D. F. Sarmiento was quietly

I20 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

elected and inaugurated. Though Mitre was twice again
a candidate for the presidency and leader of insurgent
forces, his main business in life was literary.

In 1869 Mitre founded La Nacion, to-day one of the
leading newspapers in the country. His Historia de Bd-
grano, originally published in 1858, he improved and
brought out in new editions. His monumental work,
however, was La Historia de San Martin, printed in 1888.
It was such a history as one great soldier could write of
another.

During Mitre's administration as president there was
much literary activity in Buenos Aires. Three literary
journals, La Revista argentina, El Correo del Domingo,
and La Revista de Buenos Aires, flourished. The last
directed by Vicente G. Quesada and Miguel Navarro
Viola was the official organ of an influential literary so-
ciety, the Circulo literario, among whose members were
numbered nearly everybody of prominence in the city.
The study of Argentine history absorbed much of their
attention, and occupied more than half the pages of the
review.
>N A contributor was Luis L. Dominguez (1819-98),

whose historical studies were later printed as Historia
argentina, covering the period from the discovery of
America to the beginning of the revolution against Spain.
Among his fellow exiles in Montevideo he made himself
remarked for his verses, especially those which he pre-
sented at the famous literary contest of 1841. In verses
of a romantic type he quite caught the spirit of the master
Echeverria. And a descriptive poem of his. El Ombu,
has remained a classic of Argentine poetry. About that

ARGENTINA 121

shade tree Dominguez made the whole of Argentine life
revolve. The opening stanza of the poem, perhaps little
more than a jingle, is known by heart by every school
child.

Cada comarca en la tierra
Tiene un rasgo prominente:
El Brasil su sol ardiente,
Minas de plata el Peru,
Montevideo su cerro,
Buenos Aires, patria hermosa,
Tiene su pampa grandiosa;
La pampa tiene el Ombu.

Dominguez, during Mitre's administration, held im-
portant governmental positions and later rose to promi-
nence in the diplomatic service of his country.

Another historical writer of the same group was Vicente
Fidel L6pez^i8n;-iQ03), son of the author of the Ar-
gentine national hymn. His Manual de Historia argentina
became the standard text-book for schools. His place
of refuge from the tyranny of Rosas was Chile where he
was one of the Argentine journalists so influential in the
literary history of that country. There he collected the
material for some historical novels which were numbered
among the first of the kind to be written by Argentines.

At one time a fellow exile with Lopez in Chile was Juan
Bautista Alberdi (1810-84), ^ "^ost voluminous and
influential Argentine writer. When a youth of fifteen
he was given one of the public scholarships at the Colegio
de Ciencias morales founded by Rivadavia whose fore-
sight recognized the value of education in a democracy.
Being a member of the Asociacion de Mayo in 1837 he

122 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

was obliged to seek safety from Rosas by flight. In Monte-
video he completed his studies for the doctorate of law.
At the same time he was active in journalistic work by
writing humorous descriptive articles of manners and
by contributing to the comic sheet, illustrated by carica-
tures, Muera Rosas, one of the many forms of attack on
the tyrant. In 1843 Alberdi went to Europe on a ship
named the "Eden" and in fantastic prose wrote out im-
pressions of the voyage which he proudly published as a
poem with the same name. But his enduring reputation
is due to a critical examination of Argentine history and
the suggestions for a suitable form of government for the
country contained in his Bases para la Organizacion de
la Republica Argentina.

This book was written in Chile after his return from
Europe while the final campaign against Rosas was being
waged by General Urquiza. When a congress met after
Rosas' overthrow for the purpose of preparing a consti-
tution for the republic, the Bases directed the otherwise
conflicting and vague ideas of its members along logical
lines so that Alberdi's suggestions became to all intents
the constitution of the Argentine republic. A curious
synchronism of events has been noted herewith. In IVfay,
1 85 1, General Urquiza declared his revolution against
Rosas and began to prepare his campaign. In May, 1852,
Alberdi's book came from the press. In May, 1853, the
constitutional convention voted the constitution. The
foreign reader should remember that May is the glorious
month of Argentine history, for the twenty-fifth is the
national holiday.

Argentina's indebtedness to Alberdi was recognized

ARGENTINA 1 23

two years later by a decree of the government to deposit
in the national archives certain of his writings signed
with his autograph and to print at public expense an
edition of his works. Alberdi was entrusted with impor-
tant diplomatic missions in Europe, but he did not
always meet the views of his compatriots respecting their
foreign policy. His later years were spent for the most
part in Europe in the diligent production of political
and economic writings.

Among the expatriated Argentines the one who became>^
the most thorough man of letters was Juan Maria Gutier- Y^
rez (1809-78). With Echeverria and Alberdi he was ac-
tive in the Asociacion de Mayo and suffered three months*
imprisonment in Rosas* jails before going into exile. Gu-
tierrez was initiated by Echeverria ihto his literary as
well as his political ideals, for within a year after the pub-
lication of La Cautiva, Gutierrez wrote Los Amores del
Payador, a long poem closely following the master's
doctrine of the Americanization of literature of which
he remained an ardent advocate. In Montevideo in 1 841,
Gutierrez distinguished himself by winning the first prize
in a literary contest by an ode. La Revolucion de Mayo,
It is praised by Menendez y Pelayo because it "departs
greatly from the current vulgarity of the patriotic odes,**
though at the same time the Spanish critic is very im-
patient with the poet for his anti-Spanish expressions.
Refinement and good taste, however, are the marks of
Gutierrez* poems.

In 1846 Gutierrez published a collection of the poems
written by Spanish Americans with the. title of America
Poetica. Its purpose of attracting the attention of Euro-

124 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

peans undoubtedly succeeded. In the matter of taste in
selection subsequent collections have not excelled it.

Gutierrez passed a part of his period of exile in Chile
and Peru where he materially broadened his knowledge
of literature. In Chile, he was one of the group of Argen-
tine exiles who were prominent in writing for the news-
papers.

After the fall of Rosas, Gutierrez participated in poli-
tics. He was a prominent member of the constitutional
convention of 1853. And as minister of foreign affairs
he negotiated an important treaty with Spain. Recogni-
tion of Gutierrez' scholarship led to his appointment as
rector of the University of Buenos Aires, a post which
he held for many years.

Gutierrez' interest in literary studies and his contri-
butions to the Revista de Buenos Aires made it one of the
most important reviews in America. Afterwards printed
in book form his Bihliografia de la primera Imprenta de
Buenos Aires and the Estudios biogrdficos y criticos sohre
algunos Poetas anteriores al Siglo XIX made his name
widely known among scholars. The presentation of a
copy of the latter to George Ticknor was the origin of
some interesting correspondence between the two men.
To the end of his life Gutierrez encouraged the production
of literature, as is evident by the many introductions usu-
ally enthusiastic in tone which he wrote to accompany
the volumes of younger men. From 1871 to 1877 he con-
ducted with V. F. Lopez the Revista del Rio de la Plata
whose pages were the medium of publication for their
literary and historical studies.

Among the enemies of Rosas the man who most nearly

ARGENTINA 1 25

approached positive genius was DomingoFaustinoSar-
miento (181 1-88). This fact is partly recognized in the
epithet, "loco Sarmiento/* by which Rosas* official
journal in Buenos Aires was accustomed to refer to him.
His individuality was as uncommon as his intelligence.
From almost absolute indigence he rose by personal en-
deavor to be presidfint-QL the^Argeatine_E.epublic. His
schooling was limited to a few years in a primary school,
but he utilized every means falling to his command to
extend his education. One of the books which came into
his possession about the age of sixteen was the auto-
biography of Benjjimin Franklin who thereafter became
hisjnqdel.

The vicissitudes of his career began at about the same
age. Having been summoned to attend military drill by
the governor of his province, he refused and soon there-
after joined an uprising against the party in power. As
the result of this act, after barely escaping with his life,
he found himself an exile in Chile.

The peculiarity of Sarmiento's politics resided in the
fact that he was a provincial partisan of the citizens of
tiuenos Aires who were demanding a strongly centralized
government with the city at the head. In fact after the
return from his first exile, he became a member of a branch
of Echeyerria's Asociacion de Mayo. On the other hand
Rosas represented the federalistic theory which accorded
practical autonomy to the provinces, each ruled by a
governor. Though nominally appointed by the govern-
ment at Buenos Aires, these governors were local political
bosses or caudillos, who like bandit chieftains were able
by personal strength to maintain their positions. Con-

126 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

sequently risings in the provinces though theoretically
in support of the centralizing tendencies of the unitarian
party were really directed against the local caudillo. The
results of such fights were usually decisive, because the
defeated were slaughtered or driven into exile. Sarmiento
belonged in the province of San Juan, situated just below
the Andes mountains through whose passes he more than
once journeyed into safety in Chile.

The full story of Sarmiento's participation in the fighting
in his own country and his efforts to earn a living in Chile
is needless here. In regard to the latter it is sufficient to
say that teaching school and writing for the papers were
the most important at the time and in their results on his
subsequent life. His readiness to enter into a controversy
and the biting character of his clever satire made him
many enemies. But a Chilean politician, Manuel Montt,
afterwards president of Chile, not only made use of his
brilliant journalistic ability but also stuck by Sarmiento
through thick and thin. Sarmiento's role, in the outburst
of literary activity, which followed his criticism of Andres
Bello's poem on El Incendio de la Compaiiia is elsewhere
discussed.^

This preceded the establishment of the University of
Chile of which Bello was appointed the first rector, while
Sarmiento was given a place in the faculty of philosophy
and humanities. At the first session of the faculty, he read
a paper proposing certain changes in spelling Spanish
which were later adopted. Partly to Sarmiento's initiative
as well as to Bello's scholarship is due the fact that, of all
countries where Spanish is spoken, Chile has the credit of
1 See page 198.

ARGENTINA 127

Introducing reforms_jn__ojlliQgraphy. Sarmiento also
interested himself in the introduction in the primary
schools of improvedjethods of teaching, children how to
read^^ And at the instance of Montt he was made the
principal of the newly established normal school. By the
year 1845, however, the political situation claimed all his
time for the editing of El Progreso in support of his patron
Montt. Then appeared as daily articles the substance of
the book to which Sarmiento chiefly owes his literary
fame, Facundo 0 la Civilizacion yja Barbarie.
Aj This book, nominally the biography of Facundo Quiroga,
the caudillo lieutenant of Rosas, performs for the latter's
regime the same damnatory service as MarmoFs verses.
Perhaps it was even more widely known. As the articles
were promptly reprinted in Montevideo, it is not impossi-
ble that they suggested to Marmol his treatment of Rosas
in the celebrated novel Amalia published five or six years
later. Facundo Quiroga had been active in Sarmiento's
native province and it was to escape death at his hands
that Sarmiento had first taken the road to Chile at the
age of twenty. The tale of Quiroga's atrocities occupies
only the central part of the book by_H[ay^ illustration to
the economic and political principles developed in the
remainder. The opening_cha4iters__are_ devoted to a de-
scription of the Argentine country, both brilliant and
masterful, and to the student of Argentine history indis-
'pensable. The concluding chapters give an exposition of
Sarmiento's political ideas which undoubtedly assisted in
laising him to the presidency of the republic.
^ The physical conditions of the Argentine, the isolation
and primitive ignorance of the^aucho, his belief in forj:e

128 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

as the only means of overcoming iJi£ diflB-Cukles^jofJife,
his consequent contempt for a civilizatiQEL- based on in-
telligence, are the causes, according to Sarmiento, of social
anarchy in that country. The gau^o thus typifiesj)ar-
barism in strife with civilization exemplified by the city of
Buenos Aires. Without the support of the local caudillos,
such as Facundo Quiroga, a tyranny like that of Rosas
would be impossible. But even Rosas face to face with
the difficulties of government was obliged to practice
unitarian principles, "though the label on the bottle said
differently." The Argentine Republic without rivers and
mountains to mark natural boundaries can "be only one
and indivisible." So thought Sarmiento in 1845, but after
wider experience from his travels in the United States he
became a champion of the federal principle which finally
prevailed in Argentina.

Sarmiento, believing that his book Facundo would open
a way for him in Europe, desired to visit it. In this pur-
pose he was assisted by his staunch friend Manuel Montt,
who procured for him a commissionership ostensibly for
the purpose of studying European schools with a view of
finding possible reforms for Chilean schools. Throughout
his European tour Sarmiento industriously made inspec-
tion of educational systems of which he published an
interesting report, DeJ^_EdAuacwn^j^opular, But from
the point of view of literature his book published at the
same time, Viajes por Europa, Africa y America is more
important and interesting. The latter was widely re-
produced in various journals. It consists of a series of
brilliant pictures arranged to suit the political ideas of the
writer but drawn with such clearness of detail that the

ARGENTINA I29

unbiased reader may examine them with pleasure. He
portrays France regenerated by its great revolution and
placed at the head of humanity; on the other hand, Spain
lies prostrate amid the artistic ruins of her former splen-
dor; the future, however, belongs to the rising culture
of North America. The anti-Spanish character of this
book called forth a reply from a satirical writer, then
popular in Spain, Juan Martinez Villergas who at-
tempted to counteract its effect by a pamphlet, Sarmen-
ticido 0 a mal Sarmiento. But putting aside the po-
litical reflections, Sarmiento's Viajes is of its kind good
literature.

After an absence of three years, Sarmiento returned to
Chile by way of North America and Cuba. Political
affairs in Argentina were beginning to look toward the
fall of Rosas. Sarmiento attacked him so vigorously in
the press, that Rosas called on the Chilean government to
forbid Sarmiento the right to continue his activity, a
request which was promptly refused. Sarmiento replied
by a pamphlet, discussing the form of government suitable
for the country after Rosas* fall. Sarmiento was plainly
endeavoring to make himself a central figure in any re-
construction of the government. To further this pur-
pose he published, Recuerdos de Provinciay a series of
sketches ajid_ anecdotes about himself, his parents, rela-
tives and friends. The student of literature must
recognize the lifelike quality of his characterization
equal in many respects to Addison's famous De Cov-
erley papers. To Sarmiento's numerous enemies, the
book seemed only another instance of the man's over-
whelming vanity, — so great, according to the Chilean

130 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Benjamin Vicuna Mackenna, that the whole pampa would
not hold it.^

Accordingly when General Jose Urquiza, the caudillo of
the province of Entre Rios, hitherto the strongest sup-
porter of Rosas, raised the banner of revolt, Sarmiento
joined his army. General Urquiza, however, after the
victory at Monte Caseros, disappointed his followers by
continuing on his own account the personal government of
his predecessor. Sarmiento returned to Chile once more
to engage in journalism. But his stay was short, for
when Buenos Aires rebelled successfully against Urquiza,
Sarmiento came again to the city. From 1855, he played a
prominent part in politics. After the battle of Pavon
where Mitre*s defeat of Urquiza decided for all time the
question of constitutional government for the Argentine,,
Sarmiento was sent to the outlying provinces as auditor
general of the armies, a position which gave him great
influence. It helped him to become governor of his native
province of San Juan to which office he was elected in
February, 1862. He became so arbitrary and independent
that he worried the central government at Buenos Aires.
President Mitre solved the difficulty by appointing him
ambassador to Chile and later minister to the United
States. While in the latter country in 1867 he was
elected to the presidency of Argentina.

Sarmiento's administration was marked in the matter
of progress by the completion of the railroad from Rosario
to Cordoba, an event which was celebrated by an exposi-
tion in Cordoba. The President's journey thither was a
continuous ovation because among the provincials, if
* "su vanidad no cabe en toda la Pampa."

ARGENTINA 131

not in Buenos Aires, he was popular. At his suggestion
also a naval academy was founded and three vessels of
war purchased. He caused to be put in effect the clause
of the constitution calling for the establishment of a
national Argentine Bank.

On the other hand, his administration was harassed by
the outbreak in Entre Rios of two uprisings by the cau-
dillo Lopez Jordan^ who had assassinated the old leader
General Urquiza. The second time Sarmiento proposed
to deal with the outlaw in the manner followed in the
United States at the time of Lincoln's assassination,
namely, by putting a heavy price on the bandit's head.
The proposition was rejected by the Congress and by
public opinion on the ground that it was an inalienable
right of a man of Spanish race to start a rebellion and
therefore it would be wrong to treat him like a criminal.
Lopez Jordan replied to Sarmiento by hiring some Italian
sailors to murder him, an attempt which happily failed.
Sarmiento, on account of the rigidity of his character,
was not popular, but his administration was certainly
an era of progress.

Though Sarmiento retired from the presidency in 1874
he did not withdraw from public life. It is needless to
follow his various activities here. It is sufficient to call
attention to the fact that his interest in the cause of popu-
lar education was still predominant, and among other
offices held by him he was the first national superin-
tendent of Argentine schools, and effected many reforms.
In recognition of the courtesies shown Sarmiento in the
United States, especially in Boston, where he imbibed
many of his ideas about schools from acquaintance with

132 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Horace Mann, the Argentine government in 191 3 pre-
sented that city with a statue of their great educator and
former president.

The statue is also a symbol of the growth after his
death of the appreciation by his countrymen of Sarmien-
to's services to his country. In his lifetime his advocacy
of various North American ideas was resented and most
of those whose adoption he forced were discarded. In
the judgment of Paul Groussac, the able librarian of the
National Library at Buenos Aires, Sarmiento is, in the
Emersonian sense, "the representative man of the South
American intellect"; and "the most genuine and en-
joyable writer of South America, the rude and sincere
colorist of his native plains."

Though the officially printed collection of Sarmiento's
writings fill fifty volumes, his literary fame is based on
those already mentioned. The characteristics of hjs_st5de,
its swift movement, his ability to select the strikingjietail
or apt anecdote, may be partly illustrated by the follow-
ing extract from the description of Argentina in the first
part of Facundo.^ Moreover, no better introduction could
be given to a study of the development of the most original
of all Spanish-American poetry, that pertaining to the
gaucho.

There is another poetry which echoes over the solitary plains,
the popular, natural, and irregular poetry of the gaucho. In
1840, Echeverria, then a young man, lived some months in the

1 Facundo was translated by Mrs. Horace Mann and published under
the title of Life in the Argentine Republic in the Time of Tyrants, Boston,
1868. The volume also contains other extracts from Sarmiento's writ-
ings, especially from the Recuerdos de Provincia dealing with his family.

ARGENTINA I33

country, where the fame of his verses upon the pampa had al-
ready preceded him; the gauchos surrounded him with respect
and affection, and when a new-comer showed symptoms of the
scorn he felt for the little minstrel, some one whispered, "He is
a poet," and that word dispelled every prejudice.

It is well known that the guitar is the popular instrument
of the Spanish race; it is also common in South America. The
majo or troubadour is discoverable in the gaucho of the country,
and in the townsman of the same class. The cielito, the dance
of the pampas, is animated by the same spirit as the Spanish
jaleo, the dance of Andalusia; the dancer makes castanets of his
fingers; all his movements disclose the majo; the action of his
shoulders, his gestures, all his ways, from that in which he puts
on his hat, to his style of spitting through his teeth, all are of
the pure Andalusian type.

The name of gaucho outlaw is not applied wholly as an un-
complimentary epithet. The law has been for many years in
pursuit of him. His name is dreaded, spoken under the breath,
but not in hate, and almost respectfully. He is a mysterious
personage; his abode is the pampa; his lodgings are the thistle
fields; he lives on partridges and hedgehogs, and whenever he
is disposed to regale himself upon a tonpue, he lassos a cow,
throws her without assistance, kills her, takes his favorite morsel,
and leaves the rest for the carrion birds. The gaucho outlaw
will make his appearance in a place just left by soldiers, will talk
in a friendly way with the admiring group of good gauchos around
him; provide himself with tobacco, yerba mate, which makes
a refreshing beverage, and if he discovers the soldiers, he mounts
his horse quietly and directs his steps leisurely to the wilderness,
not even deigning to look back. He is seldom pursued; that
would be killing horses to no purpose, for the beast of the gaucho
outlaw is a bay courser, as noted in his own way as his master.
If he ever happens to fall unawares into the hands of the soldiers,
he sets upon the densest masses of his assailants, and breaks
through them, with the help of a few slashes left by his knife
upon the faces or bodies of his opponents; and lying along the
ridge of his horse's back to avoid the bullets sent after him, he

134 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

hastens toward the wilderness, until having left his pursuers at
a convenient distance, he pulls up and travels at his ease. The
poets of the vicinity add this new exploit to the biography of
the desert hero, and his renown flies through all the vast region
around. '^Sometimes he appears before the scene of a rustic
festival with a young woman whom he has carried off, and
takes a place in the dance with his partner, goes through the
figures of the cielito, and disappears, unnoticed. Another day
he brings the girl he has seduced, to the house of her offended
family, sets her down from his horse's croup, and reckless of the
parents' curses by which he is followed, quietly betakes himself
to his boundless abode.

And now we have the idealization of this life of resistance,
civilization, barbarism, and danger. The gaucho Cantor corre-
sponds to the singer, bard, or troubadour of the Middle Ages.
The Cantor has no fixed abode; he lodges where night surprises
him; his fortune consists in his verses and in his voice. Wherever
the wild mazes of the cielito are threaded, wherever there is a
glass of wine to drink, the Cantor has his place and his particular
part in the festival. The Argentine gaucho only drinks when
excited by music and verse, and every grocery has its guitar
ready for the hands of the Cantor who perceives from afar
where the help of his "gay science'* is needed, by the group of
horses about the door.

The Cantor intersperses his heroic songs with the tale of his
own exploits. Unluckily his profession of Argentine bard does
not shield him from the law. He can tell of a couple of stabs he
has dealt, of one or two "misfortunes" (homicides) of his, and
of some horse or girl he carried off.

To conclude, the original poetry of the minstrel is clumsy,
monotonous, and irregular, when he resigns himself to the in-
spiration of the moment. It is occupied rather with narration
than with the expression of feeling, and is replete with imagery
relating to the open country, to the horse, and to the scenes of
the wilderness, which makes it metaphorical and grandiose.
When he is describing his own exploits or those of some renowned
evil-doer, he resembles the Neapolitan improvisatore, his style

ARGENTINA 135

being unfettered, commonly prosaic, but occasionally rising to
the poetic level for some moments, to sink again into dull and
scarcely metrical recitation. The Cantor possesses, moreover,
a repertory of popular poems in octosyllabic lines variously
combined into stanzas of five lines, of ten, or of eight. Among
them are many compositions of merit which show some inspira-
tion and feeling.

The character whom Sarmiento terms a 'cantor' was more
popularly known in Buenos Aires as a * payador,' a name
derived from the verb * payar * meaning to improvise in
verse to the accompaniment of the guitar. As Sarmiento
intimates, the popular poetry of Argentina is a derivative
of the Andalusian of the Middle Ages and has a long popu-
lar development. The episodes related by the payador
reveal a certain epic quality tinged with Moorish sadness
but tempered by the Andalusian keenness for the satirical
and the comic. Frequent also is the intent to teach a
moral lesson; barbarous at times, for the purpose often
is to inculcate a spirit of rebellion.

B. Hidalgo and J. G. Godoy used the popular poetry
in dialogue form during the revolutionary epoch for the
propaganda of their patriotic ideas, but they did not make
a literary character of the gaucho. Among the first to
put the gaucho into cultivated literature was J. M. Gutier-
rez whose Amores del Payador was written in February,
1838. It is worth while to note that this date is only a
year later than the publication of Echeverria's La Cautiva
and his suggestion regarding the utilization of Argentine
sources for the creation of a native literaturey^Zoj Amores
del Payador should be ranked high. It is the typical
gaucho legend. It is full of true poetical feeling. It is well
written in good Castilian. It is highly dramatic. The

136 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

reader is introduced to Juana who is waiting at the door
of her father's house for her lover, the payador. At last
he rides up mounted on his swift courser. As he is reciting
his amorous ditty, a rich suitor for Juana's hand appears.
The men's words bring on a fight. When Juana tries to
separate them she is mortally stabbed by the rich man
who is promptly killed by the payador. Over the corpse
of his beloved he sings the characteristic mournful gaucho
lament. Then covering her body with his poncho he
departs to take up again his wild life in the wilderness.

About 1844 were written Bartolome Mitre's gaucho
poems. Among them is the first treatment of the legend
of Santos Vega, a gaucho who has been called the spirit
of "popular poetry incarnate in a Don Juan of the coun-
tryside." Santos Vega was a payador who died of grief
because he had been beaten in a contest with a young
amateur in the art of improvisation. Popular report
asserted that the stranger before whose skill the inspira-
tion of Santos Vega had failed was no other than the
Devil. Ten years later after a more realistic representa-
tion of the gaucho was coming into vogue, Mitre published
the second edition of his poems accompanied by an intro-
duction and notes. In them he wrote, "Primitive cus-
toms have had many singers but almost all have limited
themselves to copying them instead of giving them a
poetic character. So it is that, in order to make gauchos
talk, the poets have used all the gaucho idioms, thus
raising a jargon to the rank of poetry. Poetry is not the
servile copy but the poetic interpretation of nature."
These words are an excellent expression of the two lines
along which this class of literature developed.

ARGENTINA 137

During the revolutionary period the gaucho served as a
mouthpiece for the opinions of Bartolome Hidalgo to
whose celebrated dialogues of Chano and Contreras refer-
ence has already been made. Their realistic form and
popular idiom served as a model for Hilario Ascasubi
(1807-75) whom, some, if not Mitre, have praised for
his "faithful reproduction of nature." One of Ascasubi's
earliest pieces was a dialogue between Chano y Contreras
who are represented as serving together in the trenches
before Montevideo and conversing on the past glories
of the country.

Ascasubi was himself a soldier who had suflFered im-
prisonment at the command of Rosas. After two years
in a dungeon he learned that the order for his execution
had been issued, but the connivance of his jailers afforded
him an opportunity to escape from the prison by dropping
over the wall into the moat. In Montevideo he was en-
couraged to write his patriotic verses by Florencio Varela,
then the leading journalist of the city. At the latter*s
expense thousands of copies of one poem were printed
and distributed to the soldiers in General Lavalle's army
as they set out on their campaign against Rosas. This
poem bore the title of Media Cana del Campo, the name
of a favorite dance, and was written in a meter which
allowed it to be sung to the tempo of the dance. Its
spirited words were intended to hearten the soldiers by
dwelling on the defeat of Rosas at the battle of Cagancha.

Florencio Varela (1807-48), younger brother of Juan
Cruz Varela, won the admiration of his contemporaries
by his energy and abilities. They sent him to Europe
to enlist the assistance of England and France at the

138 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

opening of the great siege of Montevideo. There also
he made a favorable impression of his personality. After
his return his journalistic attacks on Rosas and his lieu-
tenant Oribe were so fierce that they dispatched an assassin
who succeeded in his purpose one night at Varela's very
doorstep. Beside his political writing, Varela was the
author of some odes in the classical style on the hospital
of the Brothers of Charity, on anarchy and on peace, all
much praised by his friends. The lofty sentiments of
the poems reveal the noble character of the man.

With his encouragement Ascasubia)ntinued to produce
his gaucho dialogues and letters. A favorite device of the
poet was the letter written by the gaucho Donato Jurao
to his wife narrating recent events or by Paulino Lucero
discussing the cruel deeds of Rosas such as the execution
of Camila O'Gorman and the priest Gutierrez. (This act
was staged by the Uruguayan Fajardo.) These occa-
sional pieces were afterwards collected in a volume and
printed with the title Paulino Lucero or "the gauchos of
the rio de la Plata singing and fighting against the tyrants
of the Argentine and the Oriental Republics, 1839-51:
relating all the episodes of the nine years* siege which
Montevideo sustained heroically and unequally as well as
the combats which the gaucho patriots fought until the
tyrant J. M. Rosas and his satellites were laid low." As
the long sub-title promises, the book is a perfect mine of
facts, especially for the student of local manners and cus-
toms.

., His success in political verse led Ascasubi to attempt

an ambitious reconstruction of the life of the gaucho at the
end of the eighteenth century. The title which he finally

ARGENTINA 139

gave to the collection of his sketches originally published
in 1 85 1, was Santos Vega 0 los Mellizos de la Flor. In this
picaresque novel in verse the payador Santos Vega, "aquel
de la larga fama," relates the Hfe and criminal deeds of a
famous gaucho outlaw who flourished between 1778 and
1808. In this manner the author finds opportunity to
describe life on the estancias, its danger from the Indians,
the rural customs and ideas, the good features of gaucho
character as well as the evil and to celebrate the some-
what mythological Santos Vega himself.

After the fall of Rosas and the establishment of the rule
of General Urquiza, Ascasubi began the publication of a
periodical entitled Aniceto el Gallo from whose pages a
gaucho by that name preached unitarian doctrines to the
federalistic adherents of Urquiza. Many of his old poems
against Rosas were reprinted. Though public interest
kept the periodical alive for a year during 1853 and 54, not
many political conversions have been attributed to the
influence of Aniceto el Gallo.

Ascasubi*s verses are so closely connected with con-
temporary events and can scarcely be read without con-
stant reference to a glossary that they lack interest now,
but to his friends he was a "second Beranger." In a
degree the footnotes with which he provided the final
edition of his poems are more interesting than the text.

When Mitre condemned the gaucho jargon in the
theory of poetics prefaced to the second edition of his
Rimasy he was preparing the way for a poet of the younger
generation. Ricardo Gutierrez (1836-96) published in
i860 a volume of poems which must have obtained Mitre's
approval. The long poems contained therein, Ldzaro and

I40 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

La Fibra Salvaje, have been termed by enthusiastic ad-
mirers the most criollo of all Argentine poems. At the
same time their expression of the passion of love is most
intense. Ldzaro is the tale of a gaucho disappointed in
love. La Fibra Salvaje possesses the intensity of a gaucho
tale at least as the title suggests. It depicts the despair
of a lover, Ezequiel, who separated from Lucia, the object
of his passion, becomes a monk when she marries another
man. After several years the husband, Don Julio, comes
in remorse to the monk's cell and, without knowing the
latter's personal interest in the matter, confesses that he
had sold his wife for gold to satisfy his passion for gambling.
The monk is so inflamed with anger that he challenges
Julio to fight. Julio is killed. Then Ezequiel lays
aside his monk's garb to enter the army of San Martin
in one of whose victorious battles he meets his own
death.

Ricardo Gutierrez became a physician. The experiences
of his calling are revealed in many of his poems, for he
constantly cries to God in prayer for consolation for the
miseries which he witnesses. In 1880 he published a novel
Cristian. The protagonist of that name is a student who,
during his vacation on his brother's ranch, falls in love
with his brother's wife to whom he discourses much of the
soul. And finally like Werther commits suicide. The
significance of Ricardo Gutierrez Hes in the fact that he
I penetrates the depth of the gaucho soul and reveals as no
\ other of his countrymen its inner workings prompting
to the deeds of violence so frequently described.

Poems in the gaucho jargon after the cessation of the
publication of Aniceto el Gallo were next written by

ARGENTINA I4I

Estanislao del Campo (born 1835). His first verses
signed "Anastasio el Polio" were ascribed to Ascasubi till
the latter denied their authorship in a letter from Aniceto
el Gallo congratulating Anastasio el Polio upon his first
efforts as a cantor. The best of Del Campo*s early poems
is the account of the battle of Pavon fought in 1861 which
it will be remembered established the supremacy of the
province of Buenos Aires in revolt under the generalship
of Mitre against Urquiza. This poem gives a mock ac-
count of the battle as a report from the defeated general.
Del Campo also wrote verse in a more elevated style; for
example, his ode to America on a text taken from Mar-
mol's lines that America prophesies liberty to the world
is readable. Were it not however for one gaucho poem
of his he would be speedily forgotten. At the suggestion
of Ricardo Gutierrez, to whom he dedicated his produc-
tion, he composed and published in 1866 a long poem en-
titled Fausto. Impresiones del gaucho Anastasio el Polio
<n la representacion de esta opera. And it is a masterpiece.

It is a masterpiece because, in retelling the story, in
homely dialect, Del Campo has retained the literary values
and pathos of the original and at the same time he paints
the reflection of the tragedy in the gaucho*s soul. The
poem fulfills the demand of Mitre that the poet should
treat his material in an artistic manner; yet it is filled with
gaucho sentiment. The setting of the story, Anastasio el
Polio's breezy humor, his metaphorical comparisons drawn
from his daily life are incomparable bits of realism. Its
effectiveness is increased by the simple direct way in which
the story proceeds.

In the opening lines of the poem the reader is introduced

142 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

to the gaucho Laguna riding along on his dappled pony,
gay with trappings of silver, so heavy that he seemed to
bear on him "a Potosi." Arriving at the river he had dis-
mounted and was unsaddling his horse when he caught
sight of a man's clothes. Then his horse neighed as a man
on horseback came out of the river. Laguna recognizes
his old friend Anastasio el Polio. After they embrace,
Laguna relates his recent adventures. He had been to
the city to collect money due him for some wool but he had
been greeted by excuses, "To-morrow. Come later. No
money." El Polio jests him on the amount of silver that
he carries about. Laguna explains that he won it from a
gambler, who had the insolence to accuse him of witch-
craft. "According to his story you'd think the Devil and

I " "Hush! friend, the other night I saw the Devil.

Cross yourself." Besought by his friend to relate the
adventure, el Polio, after fortifying himself by a drink
from Laguna's flask, began.

Being near the theater Colon, he saw a crowd going in,
so he paid his admission and went in too. After climbing
a hundred and one steps he found his seat. Then the band
began to play and the curtain went up. A doctor made
known his weariness with life because he was in love with
a little blond. In despair he called on the Devil who then
appeared. Laguna doubts that it really was the Devil.
"Half the city saw him," maintains el Polio. The Devil
then gave the doctor a glimpse of the blond. "Ah! she
was as beautiful as the Immaculate Virgin." The Devil,
before doing more for the doctor, insisted on his signing
a contract, and when it was signed, laughed so that "it
rang in my ears all night."

ARGENTINA 143

In this manner el Polio narrates the story of the opera
act by act. At the end of the tragedy he tells how Faust
visiting the prison prayed. Then the wall opened and the
girl's soul ascended to glory. Saint Michael brandishing
his sword came down from among the clouds, before
whom the Devil sank into the ground. "Lend me your
handkerchief. My head sweats; how could you see such
witchcraft?" cries Laguna. "I went about for four or
five days with a headache," replies el Polio.

The first edition of Fausto distributed twenty thousand
copies, the proceeds of which were donated by the author
to the military hospitals. But more popular still has been
Martin Fierro, published in 1872, by Jose Hernandez
(1834-86). The author was a journalist in Buenos Aires,
who founded the 'Revista del Rio de la Plata, The editions
of his poem, nearly tripled in length by a second part,
La Vuelta de Martin FierrOy are still issued. As a measure
of its popularity may be taken the fact that it used to
be on sale in country groceries and the often quoted
anecdote of the messenger sent to buy various supplies
and "the latest part o{ Martin Fierro"

The poem relates in the language and manner of the
gaucho, the story of Martin Fierro's misfortunes. Once
a small farmer with wife and child, he was taken from them
by a recruiting officer. The regiment into which he was
drafted fights with the Indians. After a while he deserts
and returns to his farm. He finds it without signs of life
and the buildings burnt. So he becomes a "matrero,"
or gaucho outlaw, in company with one Cruz. Tired of
being hunted by the police, Martin smashes his guitar as
a sign of renouncing his ties with the white race and joins

144 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

the Indians. La Vuelta de Martin Fierro, or his return
to civilization, has less movement and long moralizing
sermons by Padre Vizcacha. These however were not dis-
pleasing to its readers who found their own sentiments
voiced by his words. The generation who received this
poem understood it as a challenge to the government in
Buenos Aires that was legislating for the country people
without understanding their needs.

To others the poem symbolized the whole race of the
gaucho who has now disappeared before the advance of
the railway and European immigration. The truth of
Hernandez' representation was instantly recognized. Her-
nandez was brought up in the country and thoroughly
understood the physical conditions and the characters
whose daily life, passions, pleasures, aspirations, and
dreams he portrayed so minutely.

As literature Martin Fierro is ranked high by the Span-
ish critic, Miguel de Unamuno, who finds in it a commin-
gling of the epic and the lyric. Further he says: "When
the payador of the pampa beneath the shade of the ombu
in the calm of the desert, or on a pleasant night by the
light of the stars intones, to the accompaniment of his
Spanish guitar, the monotone decimas of Martin Fierro
and the gauchos listen with emotion to the poetry of the
pampa, they hear, without being aware of the fact, the
inextinguishable echoes of their mother Spain, echoes
which with their blood and soul were bequeathed to them
by their parents. Martin Fierro is the song of the Spanish
warrior who, after having planted the cross in Granada,
went to America to serve in the vanguard of civilization.
Therefore his song is filled with the Spanish spirit; his

ARGENTINA 145

language is Spanish, his idioms, his maxims, his worldly
wisdom, his soul are Spanish."

With the popularity of Martin Fierro, the gaucho be-
came the fashion. As a part of an evening entertainment
or as a side show to a circus the payador flourished. A
few professionals attained celebrity for their ready wit
in improvisation for it was customary to pit against each
other representatives of difl^erent provinces.

With less realism and more of the artistry demanded by
Mitre, the gaucho next appeared in verse in the Tradi-
Clones Argentinas of Rafael Obligado. These three brief
poems are poetical interpretations of the Santos Vega
legend. In the first a payador relates how the ghost of
Santos Vega had played at night on a guitar accidentally
left by a well. The second brings the famous gaucho to a
ghostly love tryst. The third narrates the death of
Santos Vega in contest with an unknown payador, to
whom Obligado gives the symbolic name Juan Sin Ropa.
According to the legend Santos Vega, the unexcelled, had
succumbed only in a contest with the Devil; but this vic-
tor's name typifies the new immigration which has brought
about the passing of the old conditions in the country.
In the words of the poem, Juan Sin Ropa's song "was
the mighty cry of progress on the wind."

Written with a like symbolism as if to mark the dis-
appearance of the gaucho, at the close of the nineteenth
century was published in 1899 the last recorded gaucho
poem, Nastasio, by Francisco Soto y Calvo. It is the
story of the death of old Anastasio, the gaucho, after a
terrific hurricane had robbed him of his wife and children.
Into this poem filled with the spirit of the pampa, the

r

146 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

author has attempted to concentrate the essence of all
the rich gaucho literature.

Two years later Soto y Calvo brought out a counter-
part to this poem in Nostalgia in which he portrays the
new life that has come into the country with the influx
of foreign immigration. An Italian immigrant, Vittor,
falls in love with a maid servant of native birth whose
employers take him as a farmhand. After their marriage
riches come to them as the reward of sturdy effort and
allow Vittor to put into execution his long cherished am-
bition of returning to Italy. But the couple are not happy;
they are homesick for the pampa (hence the title.) One's
country is where one is well off. The story would have
been better if its twelve thousand lines had been prose.

The prose treatment of the gaucho began about 1880,
when realistic fiction in the style of Zola was coming into
vogue. Eduardo Gutierrez, making use of police reports,
filled the literary sections of the newspapers with the
exploits of notorious criminals so that Juan Moreira, the
assassin, and El Jorobado, thief, became household
names. But as M. Garcia Merou points out, the romantic
payador Santos Vega has become a degenerate who
spends the intervals between his robberies in getting drunk.

But Eduardo Gutierrez by adapting one of the episodes
of his novel Juan Moreira to pantomimic representation
in a circus opened another path in literature to the gaucho.
At first to fill the part in the pantomime real gauchos rode
their horses into the circus and strummed the guitar. Soon
spoken dialogue was added to their roles. In this play
the brothers Podesta achieved a reputation and continued
it independent of the circus. Their success encouraged

ARGENTINA 147

them to stage Martin Fierro, Then original plays about
gauchos were written both in Argentina and Uruguay.
So to the present day the gaucho has kept the stage. And
from this popular origin has developed a class of plays
which represent the manners and speech of the lower
classes.

Public enthusiasm over the productions of the popular
poetry never hindered cultivation of verse along more
classic lines. The poet called on to voice the sentiments
of Buenos Aires at a public gathering in celebration of
the establishment of the third French Republic in 1870
was Martin_CQronado. He had attracted attention only
the year before by the essentially virile tone and sparkling
eloquence of his verses, a quality which made them very
suitable for declamation. As a poet of occasion he prac-
ticed also the epigram and the jocose. But his most
interesting poems are narrative pictures of dramatic
events in contemporary life. In Los Hijos de la Pampa
his heart beats in sympathy with the soldier who, wounded
by the same bullet that had killed his horse, lovingly
caresses the animal before dying. Angela is the story of
a young woman whose conduct fits her name. At her
wedding ceremony a woman appears to claim the prospec-
tive bridegroom as the father of a child in her arms.
Angela recognizes a bow of ribbon in the woman's posses-
sion as one which she had herself given the man as a token
of love. Removing her wedding veil and putting it on
the woman, Angela compels the man to marry the mother
of his child. Later Angela dies of a broken heart. In
these narrative poems Coronado reveals himself as a
disciple of Ricardo Gutierrez. The two poets resemble

148 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

each other also in their intensity of expression when treat-
ing the passion of love.

Coronado on the other hand essayed the drama in pro-
ductions the most important since those of Marmol.
La Rosa Blanca, 1877, dramatizes the efforts of a physician
to cure a girl who had become insane through disappointed
love. Luz de Luna y Luz de Incendio, played a year later,
stages with great reaHsm the days of Rosas. Cuitifio, a
despicable villain and officer of the tyrant, appears at
an evening party where he succeeds in getting his victim,
young Emilio, to betray his unitarian sentiments, whereat
he is arrested and taken to the barracks of the federal
soldiers. The scene at the barracks gives opportunity
for declamatory eloquence from Emilio. The drunken
Cuitifio and his soldiers display the utmost brutality and
thereby prepare the spectator for the killings in the last act.
These plays were partly the outcome of the efforts of a
literary society, the "Academia Argentina," to promote
the theater. The members proclaimed themselves dis-
ciples of Echeverria with the purpose of nationalizing
literature on the model of La Cautiva. As a step in this
direction they occupied themselves also in preparing a
dictionary of expressions peculiar to Argentina. The
member of this society who won the greatest name for
>L himself as a poet was Rafael Obligado. One of his best
poems, Echeverria, which may be taken as the manifesto
of the society, turns on the idea : —

Lancemonos nosotros sus hermanos
Por la senda inmortal de Echeverria.

Obligado is a genuine poet with the truest feeling for

ARGENTINA 149

the intimate moods of nature. As his family was wealthy,
he was able to spend his time observing her and putting
into verse such impressions as he willed. His earliest
long poem, La PampUy written in 1872 under the direct
imitation of his chosen master, is an ambitious attempt at
word painting. But he was more successful in such gems
as La Flor del Seibo and El Nido de Boyeros. The former
is a letrilla composed to vie with the Cuban poet, Placido's
La Flor de la Caha to which Obligado refers in the opening
lines when he declares his belief that the inspiring Cuban
beauty had no blacker or prettier eyes than a certain little
Argentine maid. Perhaps the same little maid was the
passionate, tender-hearted lass of the adventure with the
birds' nest related in El Nido de Boyeros. The poet says
he is acquainted with a girl of thirteen who likes to row
about the river amusing herself by picking flowers. When-
ever she sees him she haughtily threatens him with her
fist. One day he saw her approach a nest of boyeros
hanging over the water. When she tried to get it with a
long stick she just missed it. Thereby losing her balance
she was thrown to her seat in the boat. In anger she
started to strike the nest, but the cries of the young birds
deterred her. Instead she gently rocked the nest. While
engaged in this motherly occupation she caught sight of
the poet watching her. And thereafter when she passes
him in her boat instead of threatening him, she rows
quickly past with averted head.

Beside the breath of the pampa and the woodland
fragance rare in Argentine poetry, Obligado's lines reveal
tender human sentiments. The sense of personal loss
through the death of loved ones has seldom been more

I50 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

exquisitely expressed than in El Hogar Facto. And from
El Hogar Paterno the reader discovers that the poet's love
for his country is rooted in his love for his home. The
total number of Obligado's poems is small, a fact which
testifies to the care with which he wrote. At the same
time he claimed a romanticist's freedom of treatment.

Partly from this and partly from his choice of subjects
came about the most interesting episode of his literary
career. One day he sent a challenge written in tercets
to his friend Calixto Oyuela to debate in a Justa Literaria
the old question of classicism and romanticism. Nothing
averse, the latter, who had just been winning some prizes
in Buenos Aires for his classic verses, replied in tercets
accepting the challenge. In the same meter and form
they reproached each other for what each one believed to
be the other's shortcomings. Obligado thought that Oyuela
was neglectful of the light of the present ideal and unmind-
ful of the Andes. Oyuela replied that Obligado was irrever-
ent of the past. Finally the poets agreed to submit their
contest to an older poet, Carlos Guido y Spano, a man who
inspired great respect and even affection in his contempo-
raries. In a genial letter, interesting to the student of lit-
erature in many ways, Guido y Spano replied in this strain.

The guitar is worth as much as the lyre. For a new
world, new songs. But form must be considered. Ob-
ligado's exquisite Flor del Seibo would perish were it not
preserved in a vase of fine crystal. Therefore the judge
advises Oyuela to stop reading Homer and spend a few
hours with Aniceto el Gallo and Martin Fierro. On the
other hand, Obligado should go to Athens and Greece.
Then the two poets will understand each other without

ARGENTINA 151

need of his decision. Let them make truce and continue
singing each in his own fashion.

ObHgado referring to the ancient habit of presenting
the victor of a poetic contest with a rose, sent to Oyuela
his Flor del Seibo. The latter in acceptance complimented
his adversary on possessing more true American savor
than any other and advised that they make war on their
common enemy, that literary pest, Gallic imitation.

To understand the significance of the Justa LiUraria,
it is necessary to consider certain minor movements in
Argentine poesy. Even Echeverria believed that poetry
was a sort of handmaid to morality and humanitarianism.
A spiritualistic tendency of this kind easily joined itself
to an undercurrent of classicism. And when about the
year 1880 literary societies established contests in Buenos
Aires to which they gave the old name of "juegos florales,**
the poems submitted to the judges were compositions on
the classical or philosophical order.

Calixto Oyuela was a prize winner in these contests,
in 1 88 1 with his Canto al Arte and the next year with
Eros. The latter is a very beautiful poem, distinguished
on the one hand for its correctness of diction and classic
spirit and on the other for the development of the senti-
ment which it expresses. The poet declares that love is
the inspiration of all his verses. Every flower, the breeze,
each wave of the sea, the last breath of evening, the shin-
ing stars, all nature speaks to him of love.

This poem is perhaps the fairest product of the purely
classic school. In the same year in which it was written,
died the man of whom the classicists believed themselves
disciples, namely, Carlos Encina (1839-82). When nine- >

/

152 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

teen years of age, he won first prize in a school contest
by a Canto lirico al Colon, Later he wrote two poetical
dissertations, Canto al Arte and La Lucha por la Idea.
They comprise practically all his compositions in verse,
for he became a teacher of mathematics and of philosophy
along evolutionary lines. His poems are judged some-
what harshly by Menendez y Pelayo on the ground that
they are not poetic but are merely the versification of
Hegelian and Spencerian ideas. How the Argentines re-
garded the poems has been told by Ricardo Gutierrez.
To them they opened a new course of aesthetics which
was the religion of the new school.

Carlos Guido y Spano (bom 1829) was, however, the
grand old man of the classicists. He was the one who
gave them translations from the Greek and showed them
by example what correctness of form meant. His sober
and severe style was a development of his later days as
one may discover by reading the verses published in the
collection of 1871, Hojas al Viento. Here are revealed the
same tenderness of feeling and the same breadth of sym-
pathy which made him personally so beloved. Sympathy
with the bereaved or the sufferer from injustice is the
dominant note of his best poems.

Perhaps he inherited this trait from his father Tomas
Guido, one of San Martin's generals at the battles of
Chacabuco and Maipu, and an orator of renown. At
any rate the poet relates in the autobiographical sketch
prefixed to Rdfagas, a volume of collected newspaper ar-
ticles, two notable instances of his own nobility of char-
acter. In 1 85 1, his brother being sick in Paris, Carlos
was sent by his parents to look after him. When he ar-

ARGENTINA 153

rived he found his brother dead. Paris was in an uproar
of revolution. Filled with democratic enthusiasm for
justice the young Argentine fought behind the barricades.
Luckily he came away alive, for in 1871 an opportunity
offered for him to show the same spirit of disregard of
self, to the benefit of his native city. Buenos Aires was
being ravaged by an epidemic of yellow fever and it was
necessary for a popular commission to fight the peril.
As a member of it Carlos Guido y Spano distinguished
himself by his activity.

Sympathy with a sister nation inspired him to his most
ambitious poem, Mexico: canto epico. When the French
invaded Mexico in 1862, their army at first met with
defeat. Guidons sentiments on this occasion are so ve-
hemently expressed that the Mexican critic, Sosa, declares
that one might easily suppose the author of the poem to
be a Mexican. But Guido y Spano was equally moved
by the injustice of an act when his own country was a
participant. The result of Argentina's coalition with
Brazil to oppress Paraguay is most pathetically signified
in Nenia, This brief poem is one of the most precious
gems of Argentine lyrism. It is the lament of a young
Paraguayan girl who has lost her parents, brothers and
lover by the ravages of the war. The lament begins and
ends with an apostrophe to the urutau, a native bird of
sweetest song, perched on the yatay, a kind of palm tree.

Llora, Uora, urutau,
en las ramas del yatay;
ya no existe el Paraguay,
donde naci como tu.
Llora, llora, urutau.

154 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

No less affecting is the poet in rendering his personal
feelings, whether it be to his mother, A mi Madre, or to a
friend just bereaved by the death of her father, A I Pasar.
Few poems depicting the awakening of a first love excel
En los Guindos; the boy has climbed a cherry tree and
as he tosses the fruit into the outspread skirt of his girl
companion, his heart fills with emotion as he glimpses
her charms.

It is easy to understand why Guido y Spano should
have been selected by Oyuela and Obligado to decide
their literary joust. With Oyuela he had in common a
reverence for form, and with Obligado a love for the
tender and sentimental. But their verses began to seem
trivial to the public beside the grandiloquent outbursts
of a poet who is generally regarded as Argentina's greatest
y poet, Olegario Victor Andrade (1838-83).

Before the juegos florales of 1880 he was scarcely heard
of because he was on the wrong side in politics. He was
one of the boys whom General Urquiza had ordered to
be sent to school and to the university. He repaid his
patron by dedicating to him a poem. Mi Patriae which
won a prize in the school contest in 1856. But he lost
favor the same year by marrying at the age of eighteen.
He supported himself by writing for provincial papers.
In i860 he became private secretary to President Derqui,
but as his government was soon overthrown, Andrade
had no resource but to continue to write in the provinces.
Though he once succeeded in securing a place in Buenos
Aires, he lost it by espousing the cause of Urquiza against
Sarmiento. In the following administration of Avel-
laneda he held a position in the custom house at Con-

ARGENTINA 155

cordia, but was accused of negligence in administration,
a charge from which he was later acquitted. With the
advent of General Roca to the presidency in 1880, the
provinces acquired a larger share in the government.
Roca placed Andrade in charge of La Trihuna as chief
editor of this government organ. And after his death,
in 1883, President Roca assisted Andrade*s widow by
buying from her for the National Library the manuscripts
of all his poems for sixteen thousand pesos, and by print-
ing at national expense a fine edition of his poems. More-
over, President Roca paid Andrade the personal compli-
ment of delivering an oration at his funeral.

Andrade*s poems are characterized by a declamatory
eloquence on patriotic topics and an exaggerated Amer-
icanism. They are didactic on the theory that the poet
has a mission to preach to the multitude. Having been
written within the space of five years when the man
was about forty years old, they display a certain unity
of conception which, despite their diversity of title, gives
them additional force.

The first of this series of mature poems is El Nido de
Condor es, dated 1877. A condor's nest situated on a
gloomy and precipitous clifF above a defile in the Andes,
surrounded by a white band of snow, amid perpetual
silence, has attracted the poet's attention. Musing he
recollects the stirring events of which the nest of the
condor witnessed in part at least, San Martin's passage
of the mountains, the battles of Maipii, of Chacabuco,
the disaster of Cancha Rayada.

The next poems are more personal, to General Lavalle,
to San Martin, El Arpa Perdida, an elegy on the poet

156 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Luca, singer of Argentine triumphs in revolutionary
days, who was drowned in a shipwreck in 1824. Heroism,
American heroism is ever his theme as in the ode, Pay-
sanduy to the memory of the victorious Uruguayans.

In Atldntiday which won him a prize in the juegos
florales of 1881, Andrade advanced to a more abstract
and prophetic tone. This poem, dedicated to the future
of the Latin race in America, begins with a summary
of the history of that race. Rome, Spain, France, have
each in its turn risen to leadership and fallen to decay.
But in America are republics, the poet characterizes each
in memorable lines, republics where life beats high and
liberty will come to full fruition.

The poet's mission as a teacher and prophet is exalted
in a Canto a Victor Hugo. To Andrade, the French poet
seems greater than any of his predecessors, who have
tried to uplift humanity, excelling Isaiah, Juvenal or
Dante. He possesses the peculiar qualities which marked
each of them. And he lives in France, "height where
nests human genius." But in America, "new theater
which God destines for the drama of the future, free
races admire thee, Orpheus, who went down in search of
thy beloved, sacred democracy. And across the seas, O
setting star, the sons of the dawn salute thee."

Hugo replied to this effusion by nothing more than a
few courteous words of thanks; whereby it was "ill paid,"
in the opinion of Menendez y Pelayo. But Valera is
uncertain whether Hugo was vexed at being called old
and a setting star or whether the French poet was ignorant
of Castilian and failed to understand the poem.

In Prometeo, the most transcendental of his poems.

ARGENTINA 157

Andrade wrote the spiritual history of the man of genius,
of the thinker who strives for the good of the human race.
We have perhaps an echo of Andrade's personal misfor-
tunes. The setting of the poem is the same as in the trag-
edy by ^schylus. The Titan lies chained to the rocks,
hurling his defiance at Jupiter and is pitied by the Ocean-
ids. Aside from the words which the poet puts in the
Titan's mouth, Andrade's innovation in the legend con-
sists in the term which he puts to the suffering. When
the Titan views the cross of Christ on Golgotha, he feels
that he may die because another martyr is about to win
the fight for the liberty of human thought and human
conscience.

The Spanish critics are somewhat captious of Andrade's
merits because his Americanism is distateful to them.
To Valera the poet's expression "Latin race" is especially
distressing. He thinks, however, that Andrade, given
a better and wider education, might have excelled both
Bello and Olmedo as he is superior in inspiration. What
the Argentines think of Andrade has been well said thus:
"He is the true national poet of the Argentines, because
he reflects in his beautiful songs the aspirations of that
young and lively democracy which frets itself in supreme
longings for liberty, progress, and civilization, while it
is the melting pot for the diverse elements of the Latin
races from which will spring a new American type, des-
tined to preside over an important evolution of the
human species in the new world." ^

Soon after Andrade was laid in his tomb, it witnessed
a strange ceremony. A paralytic whose lower limbs had

* M. Garcia Merou, Recuerdos Literarios.

158 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

been useless for ten years, was brought there for the pur-
pose of paying honor to a fellow poet by laying on the
tomb a wreath which he, Gervasio Mendez (1849-98), had
won in a poetic contest. For many years Mendez was a
pathetic figure in Argentine letters. The poems sent
forth from his couch of suffering rang with no feigned
note of melancholy. Wh^ he besought, in Los Ndufragos
del Mundo the pity of the world upon the failures, or
urged in Amor Celeste the joy of religious consolation,
there sprang to mind the poet's own story. Friends by
printing editions of his poems and assisting their sale
helped to keep him in the public mind. Leopoldo Diaz
in a sonnet compared him to the bound and helpless
Mazeppa. In a measure Mendez was a precursor of the
youthful poets whose pseudo-melancholy began in the
late seventies to be the fashion. His first volume of
verses, printed in 1876, was greeted by the veteran critic
J. M. Gutierrez with the enthusiastic cry that a real poet
had appeared in Argentina.

The early eighties witnessed in Buenos Aires a peculiar
recrudescence of French romanticism of the type of Alfred
de Musset. The youths who prided themselves on writing
verses like the master sought also to imitate him in
manner of life. They organized a society, the "Circulo
Cientifico Literario," to foster the production of poetry
by listening to each other's lines. Translations of their
favorites, such as Gautier's Albertus, De Musset's Rolla
were interspersed with recitations in the original of the
most risque passages of the same poets. Making Murger
their model the young Bohemians indulged in much
horseplay not always devoid of Bacchanalian excesses.

ARGENTINA 1 59

The verses of some of these young men are interesting
to read. Julio E. Mitre, president of the circle, imitating
the elegies of Gautier sang that love was the sweetest of
goods and the cruelest of ills. Adolfo Mitre (1859-84),
took immense pains with the form of his verses melancholy
in tone on gloomy topics. Alberto Navarro Viola (1856-
85), possessed a wider literally and moral horizon in
his poems on Giordano Bruno, Voltaire, and Moreau,
though a series of twenty-five poems on the death of his
mother, the memory of her kisses and his doubts after
her death, gave forth the truest note. He also published
an annual bibliography of literary works printed in
Buenos Aires, which is now of real value to the student.
To Luis S. Ocampo was due the introduction of orgiastic
lines in the manner of Espronceda. Domingo Martinto
strove for Parnassian elegance and succeeded so well that
some of his poems might easily be taken for translations
from the French.

Equally as careful in expression was Martin Garcia
Merou (b. 1862). His literary activities were many
and various, including attempts at the Zolaistic novel
in Ley Social, For a time he mystified his companions by
publishing sane criticisms on their mad verses. To him
we are indebted for an amusing and instructive account
of the movement in his Recuerdos Literarios. Long con-
nected with the diplomatic service of Argentina his
graphic pen described the life of those countries in which
he resided. More than fifteen volumes of verses, tales,
and criticism bear his name. Another poet who began to
write with these young men (his ode El Descubrimiento
de America won a prize in 1882), but who lived longer

l6o LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

than they and continued to write for twenty-five years
was Enrique E. Rivarola. Among his later productions
were realistic prose tales of life in Argentina.

All this poetic activity of the early eighties in Buenos
Aires created an atmosphere favorable to the new ideas
in literature, which were to spread from that center through
the Spanish-American world till they affected even Span-
ish poets. The "modernista" movement, though origin-
ating in part with others, dates from 1888 with the pub-
lication of Azul by Ruben Dario. It is significant of
the cosmopolitan character of the movement that its
leader was a native of Nicaragua, who had come to Buenos
Aires by way of the west coast of South America. On
account of the world-wide influence of Ruben Dario and
the modernista school they must be studied apart from
the local poetry of Argentina.^

Lesser or younger followers of the movement than the
galaxy of the great, those whose reputations have been
mainly local, are Emilio Berisso, Eugenio Diaz Romero, Al-
berto Ghiraldo and Ricardo Rojas. Enrique Banchs, since
1907, has been perhaps the most prolific. In the monthly
review Nosotros, now representing the best literary pro-
duction of Argentina, find their opportunity for literary
endeavor such writers as Juan Mas y Pi, Manuel Galvez,
and Alvaro Melian Lafinur.

Though fiction as a kind of literature in Argentina began
with MarmoFs Amaliay other novels made their appear-
ance after the fall of Rosas. In the periodical El Plata
cientifico y literario, founded in 1854 by Miguel Navarro
Viola, a leading attraction was the historical novel La
1 See Chapter XIV.

ARGENTINA l6r

Novia del Hereje o la Inquisicibn de Lima, by Vicente
Fidel Lopez. The author attempted to depict society
in Lima about the year 1578, when Peru was startled by
the appearance ofF its coasts of the English admiral
Francis Drake on his famous cruise in the Pacific ocean.

V. F. Lopez, during his studies for his Historia Argentinay
found material for another story entitled La Loca de la
Guardia. Such was the name given to a crack-brained
woman living near the passes of the Andes, who used to
give information to the patriots of the movements of the
Spanish armies. As her mental condition was said to be
due to abuse from Spanish soldiers, Lopez made a story
out of the mystery of her life.

The periodical La Revista de Buenos Aires established in
^863 to which Lopez contributed historical articles and
J. M. Gutierrez literary criticisms tried to encourage the
production of fiction. The editors promoted an edition,
sold by subscription, of the stories of Juana Manuela
Gorriti de Belzu.^ Though she had removed from Ar-
gentina in her childhood and spent her life in Bolivia and
Lima, where she was a prominent figure in literary circles,
the people of Buenos Aires were proud to claim her as a
countrywoman. The sale in 1865 of the collection of her
stories, Sueiios y Realidades, was very successful. Ten
years later visiting her native country she was received
with a royal welcome, and another collection of her tales.
Panoramas de la Fida, was brought out.

Another female writer of fiction to whom Gutierrez
called the attention of the public was Eduarda Mansilla de
Garcia who printed her work under the name of "Daniel."
^ See page 257.

l62 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

She published in i860 El Medico de San Luisy a valuable
picture of contemporary social conditions. The protag-
onist was an English doctor who had married in Ar-
gentina. The childish character of his wife is contrasted
with that of his sister Jane, a practical woman to whose
sternly Protestant mind the weaknesses of her foreign
and Catholic sister-in-law, as well as the kind of educa-
tion being given to her twin nieces is abhorrent. By this
means the author made public her ideas on the education
and social position of girls. Eduarda Mansilla wrote other
novels, one of which, Lucia Miranda, dealt with the
fortunes of that colonial heroine so attractive to Argentine
novelists and dramatists since Labarden's play Siripo.

Romantic fiction gave way to realism about 1880.
Eduardo Gutierrez* tales of criminal gauchos mark a
transition to the novels which were inspired by the appear-
ance of Zola's works. For their novels his imitators found
ample material in the cosmopolitan city Buenos Aires.
On the one hand the influence on character and family life
of the sudden acquisition of wealth afforded opportunity
for naturalistic studies, and on the other the clash between
the foreign immigrants and the native population pre-
sented dramatic contrasts.

Eugenio Cambaceres was one of the first to write in the
naturalistic manner. His Silbidos de un Fago, 1882, was
little more than sketches of life in the city and on the
estancias. That and his next book Musica Sentimental
were greeted by adverse criticism because the freedom
with which the relations between the sexes was treated
shocked the public. When, however, in 1885 he published
Sin Rumbo it had been educated sufficiently to appreciate

ARGENTINA 163

the good points of the novel. This is the story of a man
of the world who seeks in the country the restoration of
his health undermined by dissipation. On the estancia he
amuses himself by making love to a humble country girl.
After a time he returns to the city. Once more tiring of
fast living he goes back to the estancia where he finds that
a son has been bom to him. Paternal love awakens and
makes a better man of him. Unluckily his little Andres
falls sick and dies whereat the father is so grieved that he
commits suicide. The attraction of this novel lay in its
detailed pictures of native life; a long journey on horse-
back across the sunlit pampa, night on the farm, the
raging storm that turned dry brooks into torrents, the
pathetic death of little Andres. Moreover, the language
of the characters, the jargon of the peasants and the slang
of the city, with their familiar and picturesque expressions,
added to the enthusiasm of the critics who hailed Cam-
baceres as the founder of the national novel.

His next. En la Sangre, 1887, developed the suggestion
of the title by a study of the influence on national life of
the admixture of ItaUan immigration. An Italian bom
in Buenos Aires and educated in its streets succeeds in
marrying a wealthy girl by first seducing her. The fortune
thus gained is lost in speculation and there is nothing left
for Maxima but ill treatment from her ugly-tempered
husband. The novel had a tremendous success as a serial
in the columns of a daily paper.

Cambaceres, however, was not the first to study the
foreign element in the metropolis. And in fact three
novels which appeared in 1884 must have helped to pre-
pare the public for his somewhat harsher naturalism.

164 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Inocentes 0 culpahles by Antonio Argerich related the for-
tunes of an Italian immigrant who rises from his beginning
as a bootblack through various trades and marries above
his station. The eldest son is a dissipated fellow who
finally commits suicide, while the father is no better in his
later years and ends in the asylum for the insane. La
Gran Aide a by Lucio V. Lopez (1848-94), son of V. F.
Lopez, depicted the whole life of the city, its politics, its
morals, its social diversions. The youthful Blanca,
married on account of her horror of poverty, to an old man,
and Julio, for whom she has a guilty passion, are the prin-
cipal characters. Sketched from life, the originals were
known to the readers who took great delight in the per-
sonal allusions, the racy dialogue and the epigrammatic
style.

The third novel of that year, Fruto Vedadoy also a study
of political and social life in Buenos Aires, was by a French-
man whose abilities have won for him a prominent place
in the life of the city.

Paul Groussac first drew public attention by this novel
written more in the manner of Daudet than in that of
Zola, though it is also the tale of a guilty love. But the
hero Marcel is a hard worker whose passion for Andrea
resembles more a blow of ill fortune than a bit of degen-
eracy, and when Andrea's blind husband discovers their
fault. Marcel departs to start life anew in Africa. Grous-
sac after the publication of this novel devoted his time to
the cultivation of more serious literature, essays, bibliog-
raphy and history. In 1893 he visited Chicago to deliver
before the World's Folklore Conference an address on the
Argentine gaucho. This and other essays were published

^

ARGENTINA 165

in a volume entitled El Viaje Intelectual. The description
of his long journey by way of the west coast of South
America and throughout the United States, Del Plata
al Niagara, printed in 1897, is the most interesting book of
travel from the South American point of view that I know.
Seiior Groussac well deserved his appointment in 1885 as
librarian of the National Argentine Library in Buenos
Aires, a position which helpfully to students he still holds.
The monthly La Biblioteca, which he edited for two years
from 1896, contributed much to the diffusion of knowledge
r r concerning early Argentine literature.

The greatest Argentine novelist is Carlos Maria Ocantos,
who may be correctly termed the Balzac of his native
city. Following the latter's example he formed a bond of
union between his many novels by making the principal
characters members of the same family. By this device he
could lay the scenes not only in the present day but in the
past. For example, Don PerfectOy published in 1902,
written in the form of an autobiography of an old man,
gives many pictures of life in Buenos Aires as far back
as 1855. Ocantos* first novel, Leon Saldivar, printed in
Madrid in 1888 when the author was secretary there of the
Argentine legation, was greeted with applause. The
critic Ernesto Quesada, an Argentine essayist of power,
said that the novel realized in prose Echeverria's famous
dictum regarding the field of Argentine poetry.

Leon Saldivar is a rich young man who leads the ordi-
nary life of elegant society in Buenos Aires. He courts
Lucia Guerra, whose father is a wealthy cattle raiser,
living six months of the year on his estancia and spending
the rest of the time in the fashionable life of the city.

l66 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

The family's manners thus stand In ridiculous contrast |
with the refinement of their associates. The mother
allows her ambitions to sacrifice her daughter to the wiles
of a fortune-hunting Frenchman, who celebrates his
marriage with Lucia by getting drunk at their wedding.
A few months later the police appear at their house, guided
by the man's wife from France. It seems he is an escaped
convict whose deserted wife revenges herself by getting
him sent back to prison. Lucia's wedding had so affected
Leon that he fell sick with brain fever. When he recovers
he determines to seek restoration of his health by a trip
to Europe. Meeting Lucia accidentally he is about to
refer to her misfortunes when she tells him that she is
going to sail to Europe to join her husband called there
because his aged mother was dying. Such indiflPerence
and levity of mind in Lucia puts an end to Leon's infatua-
tion. When he reaches home he discovers that he is
really in love with Cruzita, an orphan girl whom his
mother had brought up. To marry her he postpones
indefinitely his European trip.

The interesting pictures of native life, the carnival,
parties, dances, the fashionable Progreso club, the summer
sports, the wedding, are drawn from reality with a master
hand. Ocantos applied his descriptive talent to the com-
position of a series of novels which now numbers a long
list of titles. They treat the many phases of life in the
Argentine metropolis. The important one of immigration,
especially of Italians, receives due consideration, notably
in one of the latest novels El Peligro, 191 1.

The peculiarities of society in Buenos Aires from the fem-
inine standpoint found an excellent interpretation in Stella,

ARGENTINA 167

published anonymously in 1905 by "Cesar Duayen," who
afterward proved to be a well-known lady, Emma de
la Barra. The keenness of observation displayed in this
book, the accuracy of its details of wealthy families, and
its pathos awakened a justly merited interest. While
the story does not deal specifically with the question of
the mingling of races in Argentina, the fact that its heroine,
Alejandra Fussier, is the daughter of a Norwegian scientist
who had married into a prominent family touches the
problem. The child of the south had been unable to with-
stand the climate of the cold north and had died leaving
two daughters. The novel opens with the arrival at her
rich uncle's house of Alejandra bearing her little sister
Stella, whose lower limbs are paralyzed. Her father had
never returned from a scientific expedition to the Arctic.
According to his instructions in that event she had come
to Buenos Aires. Having inherited her father's talent,
being well educated and showing in her disposition the
northern strain in her blood, Alejandra proved very at-
tractive to the men of the household, especially to Maximo,
the bachelor brother of her uncle's wife, because she was
such a contrast to the native women. Moreover, her
womanly qualities in caring devotedly for the crippled
Stella irresistibly drew the man of the world to her side.
Maximo began to devote almost as much attention to
Stella as Alejandra herself. Consequently when the poor
child died, it was easy for Alejandra to accept Maximo's
offer of marriage.

Conditions on the estancias and in the country villages
have also formed the subject of numerous sketches and
tales. Their realistic details lend them both attraction

l68 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

and power, though the author's choice of episode is often
gruesome and sometimes revolting. Roberto J. Payro,
Martiniano P. Leguizambn, Manuel Ugarte, Godofredo
Daireaux, and Carlos Octavio Bunge have practiced with
success this type of literature. Bunge and Ugarte have
also attracted attention as essayists on matters of literature
and public affairs.

The latest novels to win praise are La Gloria de Don
Ramirezy 191 1, by Enrique Rodriguez Larreta, which in
most excellent style reconstructs a historical epoch of
the Middle Ages in Spain; and La Novela de Torquato
Mendez by Martin Aldeo, 191 2. The latter is another
study of wealthy society in Buenos Aires, and is specially
recommended to those who wish to obtain a conception
of the great cosmopolitan metropolis of the southern
hemisphere.

CHAPTER V

URUGUAY

In studying the literary productions of the Republica
Oriental de Uruguay it is well to bear in mind the adjec-
tive in the official name of this country. It remains from
the local term of Banda Oriental applied to the region
before its establishment as an independent republic.
After the struggle with Spain the emperor of Brazil laid
claim to the country, but the political question was settled
at the battle of Ituzaingo, where troops from Buenos
Aires assisted. The capital, Montevideo, situated on the
* eastern side of the estuary of La Plata is a sister city to
the capital of the Argentine Republic. Their intellectual
life has been similar and their literary productions have
appeared in the journals of either city according as polit-
ical exigencies have dictated the residence of the author.
Again their material wealth is based on the same indus-
tries, cattle and grain, so that conditions of life are much
the same.

The patriarch of letters in Uruguay was Francisco
Acufia de Figueroa (i 790-1 862). He was a monarchist,
educated by the Jesuits, and his earliest verses were
satires against the colonists who were fighting for in-
dependence. When they were successful he had to take
refuge in Brazil. Later he was permitted to return. How
well he became reconciled, is evident from the truly pa-

169

I70 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

triotic inspiration of the national hymn of which he is
the author. His popularity as a literary man brought
him such positions as treasurer general, director of the
national library, and censor of theaters.

His verses, composed in the classic forms, sonnets,
letrillas, odes, canciones, and decimas, fill twelve volumes
in the collected edition of 1846, so arranged according
to the explanation of the author, as to afford the reader
an agreeable variety of matter. There is a little of all
sorts, political, religious, praise of the bull-fight, con-
gratulations on family events or election to office, epi-
grams on current gags, anecdotes or scandals. In explain-
ing the liking of the Uruguayans for the poet, F. Bauza ^
says: — "There is something local, characteristic, and pecul-
iarly ours in his style, in his turns of expression, in all he has
produced. On his pages may be observed the reflection
of what is most habitual with us and what we like best.*'

It was natural that Acuiia de Figueroa should be an
opponent of the romantic school. So when the Argentine
leaders of that school, Echeverria, Mitre, F. Varela, Rivera
Indarte, Marmol, were refugees in Montevideo about
1844, he turned his sharp wit upon them. He satirized
their peculiarities in a mock epic, entitled La Mdam-
brunada, divided in three cantos. It relates the war
which some old women begin in envy upon the young
women. The first canto describes the congress of witches
presided over by Satan before whom Malambrunada
argues her case seeking their assistance. In the second
canto the old women assemble under different standards.
Falcomba strives to obtain the chief command. Voted
1 F. Bauza, Estudios Liter arios.

URUGUAY 171

down she opposes the plan to march at night and surprise
the young. The question being referred to a council of
thirty they approve the plan. The scene of the third
canto shifts to the young women. Venus has resolved
that they shall not be surprised. So she urges them to
choose a leader and prepare their forces. They elect
Violante to whom is given as a badge of authority a crown
of laurel interspersed with rubies. When Cupid sees her,
he cries out that she is more bewitching than Psyche.
Accordingly the old women fail in surprising the young
and when the armies meet in a plain, Venus guides Vio-
lante and her escort to the place where Malambrunada
has taken her stand. The old leader is beaten and killed.
The rest of the old women flee into a swamp where Satan
hides them by turning them into croaking frogs. In this
satire on the quarrel between the classicists and the
romanticists, the poet, to be sure, gives the victory to the
latter, but he makes their exaggerations and mannerisms
ridiculous by imitating their style and fantastic episodes.

While humor and Andalusian salt may predominate
in the verses of Acuna de Figueroa, it would be wrong to
suppose that he was incapable of a more elevated strain.
Few poems have been written more heart-stirring than
La Madre africana whose purpose was to put an end to
the African slave trade, at least that part of it which was
carried on in the ship Aguila flying the flag of Uruguay.
Very nobly and simply expressed are the feelings of the
woman who sees herself robbed of husband and children.
Very scornful are the words of the poet referring to the
"bravos who proclaim liberty and make slaves."

In spite of ridicule the young men in Montevideo fol-

172 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

lowed the romantic order. The first in point of time was
X Adolfo Berro (i 8 19-41). The amount and quality of
his work is all the more remarkable on account of the
shortness of his life. His sympathies are with the fallen
and the downcast, the grief-stricken of all kinds. And
true to the example of his master, Echeverria, he sought
also to exploit the poetic in native life, as in the ballad of
Yandubayu and Liropeya. The young Indian and the
Spaniard Carvallo are wrestling in sport. When the
maiden Liropeya reminds her lover that he must that
day fight for her possession with certain of her suitors,
he desists from the sport. The Spaniard then treacher-
ously kills him in order to make love to the maid. She
indignantly rejects his advances, then suddenly consents
to follow him if he will dig a grave for Yandubayu. While
the Spaniard is digging, she gets possession of his sword.
After he has finished his task and come for her, she kills
herself, bidding him to open another grave.
^ The same legend was used by Pedro P. Bermudez
(1816-60) who turned it into a lyric drama. El CharruUy
in five acts and in verse which was produced with very
great success in Montevideo. The title was derived from
the name of the tribe of aborigines found by the Spaniards
at their arrival in Uruguay. Some of their peculiar qual-
ties, stubborn courage, taciturnity, and reserve, they
bequeathed with the strain of their blood to the present
inhabitants of that region. Hence the poetic appeal met
with a certain atavistic response in the hearers of the
drama. The action, laid in 1573, is slight, so that the pro-
duction might better be termed a dramatic poem. The
youth Abayuba adores the maid Lirompeya. Her father,

URUGUAY 173

Zapican, is willing to grant him her hand as soon as the
lad has driven the Spaniards from the country. He calls
together the chiefs who decide on war. Act three is de-
voted to the farewells of the lovers. In act four the
Spanish captain Carvallo challenges Abayuba, but by
guile he gets him as well as the maid Lirompeya into his
power. The latter resists the captain's advances even
though he announces to her the torture of her lover in
prison. In act five Lirompeya succeeds in getting hold
of Carvallo's dagger. Abayuba breaks from his prison
and finds his beloved. After a love scene, she strikes
herself with the dagger and hands it to the young man
who follows her example by killing himself.

In lyric poetry the most successful romantic was Juan y
Carlos Gomez (1820-84). There is a personal note in
his lines undoubtedly derived from the vicissitudes of
his life. One feels that he is sincere when he sings his
homesickness or rails at the evil of the world. He was
by profession a lawyer, but during his many proscriptions
from his native country he earned his living by journalis-
tic work. He was one of the group who carried the roman-
tic movement to Chile and was employed as a writer for
the Mercurio of Santiago from 1845 to 1852. When he
returned to his home he engaged in politics only to be
obliged shortly to flee to Buenos Aires. There he became
one of the leading journalists possessed of a trenchant,
epigrammatic style quite in contrast with the vague,
mournful tone of his verses. But he was not beloved in
Montevideo, because he long waged a press campaign
in favor of annexing the Band a Oriental to the Argentine
Republic.

174 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

In spite of his sufferings at the hands of political tyrants,
Gomez did not break forth in vituperation like Marmol,
but expressed his emotions in poetical metaphor. La Nuhe
is an example of this. In this poem he inquires of the
cloud: — "Why weep upon the earth that does not deserve
it.? Its perfumes serve only to cover its evil.** In many
poems he finds comparisons between his personality and
the sea, the sea that he had crossed so often, as a fugitive.
He put himself also in a legend in six cantos dealing with
an old man, Figueredo, who hates to see Uruguay under
the domination of Brazilians. To the accompaniment
of his guitar he sings to stir up his sons to a desire for
emancipation. Finally he throws away the instrument,
urging them to fight. Unfortunately in the first encounter
through the fall of his horse the old man is taken prisoner
and his sons are unable to rescue him. When he is lib-
erated and permitted to return to his country, in a long
apostrophe he refuses to do so because it is under the
domination of Brazil.

Of the same period as Gomez but with decided class-
ical leanings were Bernardo Prudencia Berro (1803-68),
at one time president of the republic who met his death
leading a revolution; Enrique de Arrascaeta a correct but
cold rhymster; and Francis X. de Acha (1828-88).

While the Argentines were pouring out their diatribes
against the tyrant Rosas, the Uruguayans found material
for the drama in his rule. Francis X. de Acha wrote in
verse Una Victima de Rosas, then La Fusion, produced
in 1 85 1, the story of two friends separated by the civil
war. Acha was a journalist and editor of El Molinillo, a
satirical sheet. To this and to other papers he contrib-

URUGUAY 175

uted many verses of a romantic type protesting against
the civil war and various social evils. The furt-loving
strain of his nature led him also to write comedies. Bromas
caseras depicts in three acts the torments suffered by the
husband of a jealous wife. In 1877 was represented his
romantic drama, Como empieza acaha. Federico tricks
Magdalena, the daughter of his partner, into marriage
during the absence of her lover Carlos, who had been sent
to Havana on business. Carlos, on his return, is found
making love to the lady by her husband. They fight
and Federico dies. But Magdalena refuses to marry,
preferring the convent.

Another drama concerning Rosas, Camila O'Cormatiy
was written by Heraclio C. Fajardo (1833-67) and pro-
duced in 1856, with great success. This dealt with a
particularly notorious act, the execution of a priest named
Gutierrez and a woman, Camila O'Gorman. In the play
a platonic affection is shown to exist between Camila
and the priest who is her piano teacher. A mutual friend,
Lazaro, is arrested as a conspirator against Rosas. To
save their friend's life by pleading with the tyrant, they
go together to his house. Rosas is smitten with violent
desire at the sight of Camila's beauty. During a momen-
tary absence of the former, the friends refer their case to
Manuelita, Rosas' angelic daughter. She promises to save
Lazaro but warns that only flight can save Camila's virtue
from the base purposes of her father. Act four discloses
Gutierrez, Lazaro, and Camila free but in the act of
conspiring against Rosas. A certain Ganon who is him-
self in love with Camila leads the police to their resort.
All escape the raid except Camila, but she is rescued later

176 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

by her friends. The love between Gutierrez and Camila
ceases to be platonlc. Gandn betrays their whereabouts
to the police. Arrested, they are shot according to the
orders of Rosas in spite of the pleadings of Manuelita.

Cursing Rosas in imitation of Marmol was also a poetic
diversion of Fajardo, but he did not do it quite so well as
his master. In other ways he won a reputation as a poet.
He won the gold medal in the certamen of 1858 by an ode
on America y Colon, Two years later he published a long
poem occupying over a hundred printed pages, La Cruz de
Azabache and in 1862 a volume of collected verse, Arenas
del Uruguay, The long poem treats the love affairs of a
poet, Helio by name. After a series of women. Ana, Maria,
Yola who deceives him, he meets Vitalia. The last he is
obliged to leave in order to take part in the war. As a
remembrance he takes with him a "cross of jet." Little
results from his participation in the war though he is
constantly dreaming of Vitalia. In the meantime, Yola
writes a lying letter to Vitalia saying all manner of evil
about Helio, among other things that he had left her. The
poem concludes with the death of Vitalia distressed by
the vision of a battle field on which vultures devour the
corpse of Helio.

The greatest figure in Uruguayan letters is undoubtedly
Alejandro Magarifios Cervantes (1825-93). At the age
of twenty he was connected with the legation in Brazil.
A year later he started for Europe. While still a student
in Madrid he published his first novel, La Estrella del Sur^
which he had written in part during his voyage from
America. This was followed by two plays, Percances
matrimoniales and Amor y P atria. In 1852 he gave to the

URUGUAY 177

world his poetic legend Cellar to which he owed his great-
est fame. On somewhat similar lines was written in prose
Caramuru, his best novel. In 1855 he returned to Uruguay
where during the remainder of his life he enjoyed various
public offices among which were those of rector of the
university and senator. The volumes of collected verse,
Brisas del Plata, 1864, and P almas y OmbueSy 1884,
were distinguished by their intense patriotism and local
color.

The scene of Celiar is laid on a ranch belonging to Don
Diego Sandoval, father of a pretty daughter. The social
conditions are those of the eighteenth century. Don Juan
de Altamira is the commander and tyrant of the town
near the ranch. He makes love to Isabel, but her head
and heart have no place for him, because the handsome
and dashing gaucho, Celiar, fills them. She even snubs
the proud Spaniard, who then pretends to give her up
to his rival. Three days before their projected wedding
there is brought to Celiar a letter asking him to come to
the bedside of a dying uncle who had been a father to
him in his childhood. Celiar sets out by moonlight, but
well on the way his party is surprised by "Indians,"
of whom Don Juan is the leader. Don Juan stabs Celiar
three times. Nobody dares denounce this act because
the Spaniard is the legal representative of the king of
Spain. He himself, however, is somewhat uneasy because
Celiar's corpse disappeared. Another victim of Altamira
is then introduced to the reader, a maid, Emilia. When
she dies in child-birth her betrothed promises to avenge
her wrongs on the Spaniard. So he flees to the Charruas,
who at the moment are ravaging the white settlements

178 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

under a mysterious cacique Toluba. He is really Celiar.
The band descends upon the village where Don Juan com-
mands and Celiar kills him. But Celiar and Isabel, who
are both injured, die in each other's arms.

Celiar is a novel in verse, written for the public in Ma-
drid. Consequently the poet was obliged to make ex-
planations of conditions, which mars the flow of his nar-
rative. In Caramuru, however, prose allows the author
greater liberty of expression.

Caramuru is a gaucho, who has carried off Lia, the
daughter of a city lawyer, to save her from marrying a
man whom she dislikes. Moreover, he had saved her
life from a wild beast so that she has fallen in love with
him, but he maintains her in platonic affection, in a
covert in the woods. After her flight with him, Caramuru
enters a drinking place where other gauchos are discussing
the mysterious event. One of them remarks significantly
that he knows the abductor and the whereabouts of the
young woman. Caramuru fights with him and kills him.
When the other gauchos pursue the assassin through the
night, he eludes them by dropping off his horse, which
goes racing on, leading the pursuers far astray. Under
the name of Amaro our gaucho enters the service of a rich
Brazilian. In time he asks his employer to loan him a
large sum of money. The Brazilian promises him a large
reward, if Amaro will obtain a horse that can win a cer-
tain race. Now Amaro is aware that an Indian cacique
possesses an exceedingly swift horse, so he proceeds to
his camp. By a little trickery, by frightening the Indians
by big medicine, he succeeds in getting away with the
horse. When the day of the race is at hand the Indian

URUGUAY 179

horse Dayman has for its only serious competitor, a noble
animal, Atahualpa. The description of the horse race
forms one of the most spirited passages in the book.
Atahualpa exerts himself to the utmost, even bursting
a blood vessel and falling close to the goal. As Amaro
races by on Dayman, he is recognized by a soldier as the
fugitive Caramuru. The latter is warned in time and
again escapes by means of the speedy Indian horse. Soon
after he learns that his hidden damsel is the daughter of
Don Carlos Niger to whom he owes his life. Consequently,
he brings her back to her father. This gives rise to a
fight between Don Alvaro de Itapeby, to whom Lia was
engaged, and Caramuru. They meet in single combat
at the battle of Ituzaingo where Caramuru gives his
adversary a mortal wound. As Don Alvaro lies dying in
Caramuru's presence he discovers that the latter is his
half brother, an illegitimate son of his own father. With
his dying words he blesses the love of Caramuru for Lia.

Criticism has been hiade that this love affair during
its existence in the forest was too platonic for reality.
However that may be, Magarinos Cervantes has succeeded
in presenting an excellent picture of gaucho life and its
ideals, love making, drinking, fighting and horse racing.
No other man so completely dominates and incarnates
the spirit of Uruguayan literature between 1840 and 1879.
Therefore his admirers taking their cue from the identity
of name are fond of referring to the author as the "Cer-
vantes criollo."

In 1865 there was published in Montevideo La Revista
literaria in which appeared the verses of Melchor Pacheco
y Obes and Laurindo Lapuente. The former were given

l8o LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

to the world by his widow. Their tone was melancholy
and sentimental and are well exemplified by the poem
A una Cruz en medio del Campo which Magarinos Cer-
vantes included in his excellent Album de Poesias urugu-
ayas. It is like life this lonely cross and grave, according
to the poet.

In contrast to Pacheco, Lapuente forgets himself in
an exalted praise of liberty and America, and his heroes
San Martin and Bolivar. In ringing verse he put such
sentiments as this: — "Land of hope was America for the
human race. In her heart God put a treasure more pre-
cious than the metal of her mines, which Spain filched
from her — liberty."

These two poets terminate the first period of romantic
poetry in Uruguay. After them the intensely personal note
is greatly modified, for their successors in the next decade
believed that poetry had a mission to put religion and
philosophy within the reach of the people. Moreover,
the younger generation were solicitous of form.

Of poets who came into notice during the seventies
there are deserving of mention Washington P. Bermudez,
born in 1847, the son of Pedro P. Bermudez, Victoriano E.
Montes, Joaquin de Salterain, a well-known physician,
and Antonio Lussich. The last was only one of a number
of minor writers cherishing the tradition of the gaucho
verse. As an exponent of gaucho literature Orosman
Moratorio (1852-98) distinguished himself in numerous
ephemeral dramas. The most attractive at this distance
of the poets in the above group is Montes. His Tejedora
de nandutiy the country lass who rejects the city wooer,
touches the heart just as El Tamhor de San Martin, the

I

URUGUAY l8l

old soldier who recollects the glories of the war for in-
dependence, arouses enthusiasm.

Washington P. Bermudez first attracted attention by
reciting a heroic ode of his own composition, Gloria a los
BravoSy referring to the successful defenders of Paysandu
in the war with Brazil. But he could also write witty
and satirical lines as shown by his compositions in the
political journal. El Negro Timoteo. His greatest literary
fame, however, like that of his father, rests upon a histori-
cal drama, Artigas. As a patriotic appeal to the Uru-
guayans this career of their national hero presented in
four acts and many scenes with a final hymn to the na-
tional colors was a triumph. Though Bermudez wrote
other plays none met with like success.

Another dramatist dealing with the period of revolution
was Estenilaso Perez Nieto in Apariencias y Realidades,
The patriotic sentiments in his drama are, however,
incidental to the main action. This is laid in the camp of
the famous "Thirty-three," that devoted band under the
leadership of Lavalleja who demanded from Brazil in
1825 either liberty or death, and won the former. In
the play the villain Carlos in order to ruin his rival Alberto
brings the Portuguese into the camp in such wise as
to throw suspicion on him. At the same time Carlos has
secreted in Alberto's tent a young girl whom he himself
had seduced and then brings upon the scene Elena, Al-
berto's fiancee. But both the Portuguese and the young
girl accuse Carlos so that Alberto is cleared of the suspicion
of treachery and reunited to his fiancee. This play greatly
pleased the public of 1877.

The notion that poetry had a definite idealistic mission

cv/

Q^ 182 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

had its stronghold in the society known as the "Ateneo
del Uruguay." In its public meetings the veteran poet
Arrascaeta announced the holy liberty of humanity;
Luis Melian Lafinur cursed tyrants; and Jose G. Del
Busto in his odes A Grecia, A Polonia, El Ideal, hurled
Tyrtaean strophes at a people crushed under a despotic
dictator. His epic romance El Ultimo de los Treinta y
Tresy a cry of indignation at the neglect of the last
of these heroes dying in poverty, received great ap-
plause. Del Busto is the interpreter of the ideas and
conscience of his country just before the revolution of
1886.

During this same period romanticism in Uruguay re-
ceived an original bent from a poet who stands alone in
X his class and manner. Juan Zorrilla de San Martin,
bom in Montevideo in 1857, was sent to study in the
University of Santiago de Chile. He returned home in
1877 with a printed volume of verses bearing the title of
Notas de un Himno whose themes were mainly faith and
love. He then began work on the masterpiece of Uru-
guayan literature, the long poem Tabare, which he read
in sections to the public as fast as it was written. When
finally published it was composed of six cantos and
more than forty-five hundred lines. At such length the
poet recited the tragic love of Tabare, the half breed
Charrua Indian, whose Spanish mother had taught him
to kiss the cross. The soft blue eyes of the mother, now
dead, who used to sing to him, haunted his memory. So
when brought a prisoner to the stockade of the whites he
fell violently in love with Blanca, the sister of the Spanish
commander, Don Gonzalo. After a while the love-sick

URUGUAY 183

Indian is allowed to depart to his tribe. He arrives to
find that the tribesmen are celebrating the funeral dance
of their deceased cacique. A certain Yamandu persuades
them to elect him their chief and then to celebrate his
election by beginning an attack upon the settlement of
the whites. Yamandu is the villain in the tragedy. He
also has seen Blanca and to carry her ofF is for him a prime
reason for the raid. The savages are successful. From
the burning houses of the Spanish village Yamandu bears
Blanca into the recesses of the forest. When Don Gonzalo
discovers the disappearance of his sister, instantly attribut-
ing the raid to Tabare, he organizes a posse in pursuit.
In the meantime Yamandu waits beside the unconscious
body of Blanca for her to recover from her swoon. Just
as she opens her eyes she becomes aware of the struggling
forms of two fighting men. Tabare had followed Yamandu
and there kills him. Tabare then carries Blanca toward the
settlement. Don Gonzalo meets them. Rushing at the
Indian, in ignorance of the truth the Spaniard plunges
his sword into Tabare's heart. The poor savage is only
too happy to die as Blanca weeps over him and embraces
him. In the closing words of the poem: "The Indian is \y
silent forever, like his race, like the desert, a tongueless
mouth, a heavenless eternity."

Comparison of Tabare with Longfellow's Hiawatha has
occurred to many, but there is little similarity either in
subject-matter or the spirit of the two poems. Critics
almost scoffing at the possibility of so sentimental a savage
have raised the question also of the likelihood of such
a character as Tabare. But Valera concludes his remarks
on the poem with an ingenious argument in favor of its

1 84 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

probability, because he believes in the all-compelling
power of love.

The style in which the author has written is described
by Valera^ thus. After stating that Zorrilla de San Martin
belongs to the school of Becquer, he says: — "The new
thing in Juan Zorrilla is that, although Tabare is a narra-
tion, in part of it he narrates and almost does not narrate.
The poem seems a beautiful series of lyrics in which the
action gradually unfolds. When the personages speak,
one remains in doubt whether it is they speaking or the
poet in whose spirit are brightly reflected the feelings and
ideas which the personages have in a vague manner."

At the time when Zorrilla de San Martin was beginning
his great poem Tabare, occurred the dedication of a
monument to Uruguayan independence in the Plaza de
la Florida. Zorrilla de San Martin was called upon to write
a poem befitting the occasion. He read his ode La Leyenda
P atria which won the greatest applause ever given to a
similar bit of literature and which since that day has
been declaimed till people are tired of it. Somewhat
classical in form and slightly reminiscent of Olmedo, the
ode develops the poet's ideas in pictures and visions of
his country's history. He sees the country prostrate
under the invader, the heroism of the Thirty-three, the
great battles of Sarandi and Ituzaingo and the possibilities
of the future.

The publication of Tabare brought its author such fame
that he was sent to Europe first as envoy to the Holy See
and then as minister to France and Spain. He has pub-
lished his impressions of travel in Resonancias del Camino.
^ J. Valera, Cartas americanasy 2a serie.

URUGUAY 185

Lately he gave to the world a historical monograph, La
Epopeya de Artigas, written in poetic style.

After the passing of the romantic epoch the composi-
tion of verse developed as elsewhere from Becquer to
the decadent school. Luis Pineyro del Campo began pub- >C
lishing verses as early as 1875, but his finest work ap-
peared much later. El Ultimo Gaucho is a long poem
descriptive of country life in which the contrast between
the new conditions and the old is made artistically mani- ,
fest. The grandfather sits by as the cart is being loaded
to depart for the day's work. He had been a soldier and
taken part in the great events of the past. To see his
grandsons engaging in such labor and enjoying the fruits
of peace makes him weep. After the cart is gone he falls
into a delirium in which he rehearses his deeds, and de-
mands his horse and lance. As the locomotive on the
railway whistles and rumbles by the old man dies, a
symbol of the primitive life fast yielding before the prog-
ress of civilization.

Rafael Fragueiro at the time of the publication of his
first volume of poems, Recuerdos Fiejos, 1887, posed as
the poet of poets attempting to practice in life the exag-
gerations and artificialities which he put into his verses.
He was the first becquerista. After a romantic marriage
he went to Buenos Aires, where he became a professor
and forgot the production of verse for a time. When he
began writing again it was in the prevailing decadent
manner.

In Buenos Aires lives another poet and professor of
Uruguayan birth, Victor Arreguine. He began rhyming
in the becquerista manner, but his latest poems were in

Y^

l86 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

the style of Verlaine. The title of one of the best, La Vejez
de Venus, is suggestive of its character, decadent, artificial,
polished and beautiful.

More national in character were the poems of San-
tiago Maciel (bom 1867). His first volume. Auras prima-
veraleSy 1884, contained a notable poem on the war be-
tween Chile and Peru. In 1893, he published El Flor del
Trebol, a long poem redolent of Uruguayan fields. The
first canto describes the happiness of a country lass in
love. She is rudely awakened from her dream by the
call to arms which takes her lover away. The second
canto recites various incidents that occurred during the
days of his presence and whose recollection cheers her
in his absence. The third canto opens with a message
which she has received from her lover. He tells her that
a severe fight is impending and that he expects to die.
One afternoon as she is absorbed in melancholy revery,
she catches sight of a horseman pursued by another.
The foremost is her lover, overtaken by his pursuer and
killed so that he falls at her feet. A poem so characteristic-
ally national as this is pleasant reading.

A prolific writer of verse in various manners is Carlos
Roxlo. He is classed as an eclectic poet with reminis-
cences of Becquer and Campoamor, of De Musset and the
Mexican Flores. This is not surprising because he is a
thorough student of literature, and in this respect has
deserved the greatest praise from all those who love
Uruguayan letters. His Historia critica de la Literatura
uruguaya is a monumental work.

The only other person who has treated the same sub-
jects is Francisco Bauza whose essays Estudios Literarios,

URUGUAY 187

were really incidental to his main interest, the political
history of Uruguay. He wrote also a few poems and was
noted as an orator.

The development of the novel in Uruguay owes some-
thing to Carlos Maria Ramirez (?-i898), important in
the history of his country as a lawyer, publicist, orator
and politician. His Amores de Marta is a romantic story,
while the unfinished tale Los Palmares is redolent of
Uruguayan fields and perhaps set the example for later
novelists who picked their themes from national events.

Asociated with Ramirez, at least in exile, was the great-
est of Uruguayan novelists, Eduardo Acevedo Diaz.
Attacking the government in 1875 with trenchant pen
for its attitude toward the freedom of the press, he was
arrested and banished. In his place of refuge, Buenos
Aires, he produced his first novel, Brenday which remained
his own favorite and has a wider appeal than his more
powerful nationalistic tales. The general plan of Brenda
is romantic in type, but the story abounds in realistic
episodes.

The title is derived from the name of the heroine of the
novel. She is the adopted daughter of the rich Seiiora
de Nerva, who desires that Brenda should become the
wife of her physician. Doctor Lastener de Selis. But
Brenda is in love with Raul Henares. This gallant young
man had saved the life of a certain Areba Linares who
thereupon had fallen in love with her savior. Conse-
quently she assists the Senora de Nerva in her efforts to
marry Brenda to Doctor De Selis, by disclosing a fact of
which she had been an eyewitness, namely, that Raul
Henares was the unknown man who during the last civil

1 88 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

war had killed the colonel Pedro Delfor, Brenda's father.
Even this disclosure has Httle effect on Brenda's feelings
either toward her lover or toward De Selis whom she
hates because he had refused to attend professionally on
her dying mother. In spite of the Sefiora de Nerva, the
lovers continue to communicate through the negro gar-
dener Zambique, whose faithfulness unto death forms
one of the most pathetic and interesting episodes of the
story. The great obstacle to the lovers* complete happi-
ness is removed by the death of the doctor in a duel with
a friend of Raul. Then Sefiora de Nerva dies of her
chronic malady. And after a year of mourning, Brenda
and Raul are married.

Acevedo Diaz returned from exile in time to take part
in the important affair in 1886, known as the revolution
of Quebracho. The result being disastrous for his party
he again took refuge in Buenos Aires. His experiences of
campaigning as a rebel he applied in writing a series of
semi-historical novels dealing with the adventures of a
family during the wars for independence won at Sarandi,
in 1825. The first of these, Ismael, was published in 1888,
followed by Nativa and then by El Grito de Gloria,

The shortest of these is Nativa which is little more than
one episode taken from the series making up the whole
story. Nata and Dora are sisters, girls from the city
living on the estancia of the "Three Ombues." On this
estate is a ruined house where Jose Maria Beron, a patriot
officer wounded by the Portuguese, has taken refuge.
Being young and a hero he is very interesting to the girls.
He prefers Nata, which fact so oppresses Dora that she
commits suicide by drowning herself in a pool. Shortly

URUGUAY 189

thereafter the Portuguese approach so that Nata is
obHged to depart, leaving her wounded lover among the
troops who occupy the estancia. This young officer is a
leading character in El Grito de Gloria. He meets death
heroically at the battle of Sarandi from where his corpse
is carried to be interred beside Dora.

The strength of this trilogy of novels consists not only
in the vivid pictures of landscapes and manners, but also
in the characterization, wherein the author approaches
the contemporary naturalism of Carlos Reyles. In fact
in discussing the trilogy one must consider the personages
rather than the plots. Ismael is the personification of
the gaucho of the period with his bravery, vices, crimes
and prejudices as he contributed to the foundation of
Uruguayan nationality. Cuaro, the Charrua Indian, is
a type taken from nature. Another element of this varie-
gated society is exemplified by the half-breed girl, Jacinta,
who rides with the soldiers, furnishing them with female
companionship, cooking their meals, fighting among them
like a man, and dying a heroic death in protecting the
body of Jose Maria after his fall.

The significance of Ismael as a work of art is set forth
by the eminent journalist Alberto Palomeque, an asso-
ciate of Acevedo Diaz in his first exile. His publication
of the review Vida Moderna was a real service to Urugua-
yan letters. In the issue for May, 1901, he says: "Ismael
is a hymn to blood. On every page is breathed hatred and
blood. The author believes that in the shedding of blood
is the law of all human progress. In this book is the ex-
planation of all our misfortunes. A society founded in
hatred, in slaughter, in blood, in violation of the family,

I90 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

in attacks on property, in terror imposed by a vulgar
caudillo who is master of lives and estates, must continue
to suffer." And in similar vein concerning Soledad, the
last novel by Acevedo Diaz, he continues. "Soledad is
the mistress of her father's murderer. Thus from an
assassin springs the germ of native society. Soledad
will have children by a bandit. On every side blood,
crimes, seduction, children of assassins. Our nationality
will have for basis crime, vagabondage and unstable abode,
a sad heritage."

When the naturalistic movement reached Uruguay,
the example of Acevedo Diaz directed attention to the
gaucho and country life in general as a source for novels
and tales. Manuel Bernardez, born 1867, was one of the
first to publish excellent realistic stories. Mateo Mar-
gariiios Solsona wrote not only short stories but prac-
ticed the novel. His Las Hermanas Flammary appearing
in 1893 followed the methods of Zola almost to the point
of direct imitation. Through the efforts of her mother,
Elvira Flammary is married to Mauricio Castaigne, but
her older sister is more attractive. Margarita's marriage,
however, fails to materialize, so she casts envious eyes
upon her sister's complaisant husband. Elvira's illness
favors the denouement, and as the illness develops into a
chronic malady after the mother's death, the household
settles down into a three-cornered affair. Another practi-
tioner of the realistic tale was Javier de Viana. His
gauchos are degenerate sons and his women vile creatures.

The master of these naturalists is undoubtedly Carlos
Reyles. Living on a vast cattle ranch which he inherited,
he found time not only to develop his property scientific-

URUGUAY 191

ally but also to imitate the literary methods of the French
and Spanish novelists whom he admired. Beba, which
he published in 1894, marked a new path in the literature
of Uruguay. The action of the story begins at the Estancia
of El Embrion. Its owner, Gustavo Ribera, is a reformer
in the methods of agriculture. So many are his innova-
tions, such as the substitution of iron plows for the old
wooden ones, the use of horse rakes and tractor engines,
scientific treatment of drying fodder, that his peons think
him crazy. He is specially interested in classifying his
cattle and in improving the breed. Growing up on the
estate is his dead sister's child Beba. When she arrives
at a marriageable age she marries Rafael Benavente, a
broker in the city. Living there bores her as much as
her husband's mode of life for he is indolent, without
ambition, and given to drink and the pursuit of pleasure.
By and by the couple visit the estancia. Rafael to cure
his ennui keeps soaked with liquor, but Beba rejoices at
every moment spent in the open. She passes her time
with her uncle whose manly strength and skill she admires
to the disadvantage of her husband. One day she falls
in with an old woman who tells her the secret of her birth,
a love child. The phrase works in her mind till in a mo-
ment of mad adoration she gives herself to Gustavo.
The weak husband merely cries when he hears the facts
from his wife's mouth. The lovers continue on the farm
for a time. One day Gustavo in Beba's presence angrily
kills his best stallion on account of defects in his progeny.
Soon thereafter Rafael and Beba return to the city. In
course of time Beba has a child, but it is still bom and a
monster. The crossing of blood relatives which Gustavo

192 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

had studied so scientifically in his cattle asserts itself as
a principle of human mating. Beba, remembering the
scene with the stallion, feels that Gustavo will despise
her. Consequently she winds a heavy work chain about
her body and leaps into a deep pool of water.

Reyles* next production consisted of three short stories
on the theme of adultery. Of these Primitivo is the most
striking in plot. In 1910 he published La Raza de Cain,
While this novel mainly consists of a study of the base
spirit of Cacio, the evil habits and manners of a certain
class of wealthy society are cruelly bared to inspection.
Cacio is a poor devil whom the rich Arturo Crooker met
at Lollege. There he bullied him physically and domi-
neered over him with his money. Their relations continue
in business, and in society on the same footing. They
fall in love with the same woman, Laura. Arturo wins
her. Cacio is like Cain always beaten by Abel and he
exclaims, "The happiness of others irritates me." One
day he slips poison into a cup of milk given to Laura and
stolidly watches her die.

In the theater the naturalistic movement has been well
represented by Samuel Blixen (i 869-1909) and Victor
Perez Petit (bom 1871). Blixen's plays bear titles bor-
rowed from the seasons, Primavera, Otono, and Invierno.
That the names should suggest the development which
takes place in the characters of the plays is plainly the
author's intention. In Primavera, the widow Emilia,
cold of heart, listens to the amorous solicitation of Bona-
facio with increasing interest till she glows with passion.
Otono was the most successful of the series. In this play
Maximo, fifty years of age, attempts to win Celeste, a

URUGUAY 193

maid of forty of angelical character. She listens, hesitates,
and finally consults her young nephew and niece to whom
she is a foster mother. When the latter begs her not to go
away, Celeste refuses the offer of marriage on the ground
that, by accepting it, she would be a bad mother to the
children whom she has cared for and taught to love her.
This play pleased the same public which laughed at In-
vierno. The principal character of the latter is an old
man of eighty-four who wishes to marry his granddaughter
to an individual whom she dislikes. He is brought to
terms by his aged wife who makes plain to him that he
has lost the fortune which made him proud.

Victor Perez Petit has been a very industrious man
of letters in several fields. He came into notice through
his literary studies, one of Zola and others published in a
volume entitled Los Modernistas, 1903, concerning such
men as Verlaine, D'Annunzio, Strindberg, Nietzsche, and
Tolstoi. Then he tried his hand at realistic tales of which
Gil is the most important. It is the study of the reasser-
tion of atavistic instincts in the son of a murderer and
prostitute. This boy is picked up from the gutter and
given a home by a wealthy man, but the depravity in his
nature comes to the surface at the age of puberty when
he attacks and kills his benefactor's young wife. In 1907,
Perez Petit published a volume of sonnets, Joyeles Bar-
baroSy written in apparent imitation of Leconte de LTsle.
Throughout the decade he wrote plays from time to time
of which he printed two volumes in 191 2.

The plays show considerable variety in both theme and
treatment. Cobarde, for example, is a drama of national
manners. It concerns Pedro who loves Natividad, the

194 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

daughter of Gil Grajales, a prosperous Spanish immigrant.
He wishes his daughter to marry RampH, an Italian, be-
cause, in his opinion, only foreigners in Uruguay are men
in that country, where the natives are idle fellows given to
boasting and singing to the accompaniment of the guitar.
Just before a party Natividad makes Pedro swear that
whatever happens he will not fight with her father. When
Gil sees the despised Pedro dancing with his daughter, he
interferes with a shower of insults. Pedro draws his
dagger but Natividad calls on him to keep his oath. Like
a coward he slinks away. His father Anastasio, however,
takes up the quarrel and kills Gil. For a time the assassin
eludes the police. When his whereabouts become known
to them through the activity of Rampli, Pedro again
appears on the scene. By fighting the police in a mad
attempt to free his father, Pedro proves, even though he
dies in vain, that he is no coward.

In other plays Perez Petit makes adultery the pivot
about which the action revolves. El Esclavo-Rey, called
a comedy, depicts the degradation of a poor clerk who
not only neglects his family but also steals for his mis-
tress. Yorick, on the other hand, is a tragedy revealing
the mental tortures of a pair of adulterers. Yorick is the
young son of Adelina whose husband, a banker, had com-
mitted suicide after his bankruptcy. She might have
saved him the bankruptcy had she used her influence;
but, knowing his intention to shoot himself, she preferred
to let him die because she was infatuated with a certain
Doctor Lazlo. Yorick is sent to Europe to complete his
education. On his return he finds his mother living in
Lazlo's house. At first Yorick is not suspicious and even

URUGUAY 195

makes love to Clara, the doctor's daughter. Objections
to his love-making somehow excite his curiosity about his
mother's position in that house. Though he questions
her, he learns little till he surprises her and the doctor in
a compromising situation. Then the truth flashes upon
him. Yorick knows that his father's life might have been
saved had Lazlo loaned him money. So Yorick deter-
mines to revenge his father by taking advantage of Lazlo's
great love for Clara. Unless the doctor will instantly go
out and shoot himself, Yorick will reveal the whole dis-
graceful story to the daughter. And she is coming to a
conference directly. Lazlo leaves Yorick. Clara enters.
While she is inquiring for her father, a pistol shot rings out.
It is significant of the power and originality of Uru-
guayan literature that it gave to the modernista move-
ment not only dramatists like Perez Petit and a review so
excellent as Vida Moderna, essentially national, however,
in their meaning, but also that it produced a poet like
Julio Herrera y Reissig and the critical essayist, Jose XX
Enrique Rodo. The poet rose so far above his local sur-
roundings that the value of his work was not fully appre-
ciated until the modernista movement began to be studied
as a whole. And Rodo is universally acknowledged by
Spanish Americans as an intellectual leader.

CHAPTER VI

CHILE

From the point of view of general education Chile, at
the close of the revolution, was one of the most backward
of the young American republics. The question of filling
the need for education became a political dispute between
the party of the oligarchs, supported by the clergy, and
the liberals. The former composed largely of the adher-
ents of a few wealthy families have up to the present given
Chile a more stable government than that enjoyed by xhe
other republics; but the liberals have from time to time
been able to obtain many concessions. With their efforts
at democratization the history of literature in Chile, no
less than her political history, is concerned.

In 1828, the liberals happening to be in power, they
promulgated a new constitution. At this time there was in
Chile a remarkable Spaniard, Jose Joaquin de Mora (1783-
1864), whose adventurous life led him over South America,
and whose Leyendas Espanolas later found an imitative
echo in American literature. President Pinto is said to
have taken his advice in preparing the liberal constitution.
At any rate he encouraged Mora, made a citizen of the
republic by special act of Congress, to attempt educational
reform in Chile by opening a school known as the Liceo
Nacional de Chile. Mora also defended the interests of
the liberal party by editing El Mercurio chileno. He estab-

196

CHILE 197

lished a literary society, wrote poems and even produced
a play, El Marido ambicioso, based on French models.
But his ascendency was short lived, for in 1829 the con-
servatives returned to power under the presidency of
Joaquin Prieto and his prime minister, Diego Portales.

By them Andres Bello was invited to Chile to serve as a
counterweight to Mora. To Bello was entrusted the
editorship of the government organ El Jraucano, which
position Bello held for more than twenty years. In this
journal he had ample opportunity to foster an improve-
ment in the literary taste of the Chilean public. To
Bello's training in education were entrusted the sons of the
leading families. On the other hand, Mora's school was
closed by governmental action and the man himself driven
from Chile in 1831.

Bello's school. El Colegio de Santiago, was held in his
own house. He conducted his instruction by original
methods, graphically described thus by one of the pupils:^
"The study of language was a complete course on philol-
ogy, which comprised everything from general grammar
and the history of the Castilian language down to the
most minute questions of Castilian grammar. The pro-
fessor followed his ancient custom of writing his texts as he
taught them. His treatise on conjugation and the most
interesting chapters of his Spanish grammar were dis-
cussed in those long pleasant conferences with his pupils.
He never explained, but conversed, beginning always by
expounding a question in order to discourse on it to his
pupils. In these conversations he was the one who talked,
at the same time almost always smoking a Havana cigar.
1 J. V. Lastarria, Recuerdos literarios.

198 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

His lecture hall was his library and all his references to
authors were made by the pupils under the direction of
the master."

In this manner were trained a body of young men who
were ready in 1842 to defend their country in a literary
controversy against the Argentine journalists who had
taken refuge in Chile. Fleeing from the tyranny of Rosas,
they had brought with them the spirit of the romantic
movement in literature taught them by Esteban Eche-
verria. And they did not hesitate to criticise adversely
the state of Chilean literature.

The first opportunity for this was offered by the publi-
cation in 1 841 of Andres Bello's poem El Incendio de la
Compania. Inspired by the destruction by fire of the
principal church left by the Jesuits in Santiago, the poem
was written in quintillas in the classical style and may be
accounted one of the most interesting of Bello's minor
productions. The poet as a spectator of the conflagration
sees the famous clock in the belfry destroyed, and hears
its farewell to the city to which "it has counted a whole
century of time, hour by hour," amid the marvellous
changes which have occurred during that era. The sight
of the ruins causes him to express his melancholy regrets
almost in the words of Jeremiah.

'^ The Argentine D. F. Sarmiento in reviewing the poem
propounded the question, "Why are there no poets in
Chile?" He answered it in a second article when discuss-
ing the foundation of a literary society in May, 1842,
by a number of young Chileans, mainly pupils of Bello.
Sarmiento said that the Chileans lacked poetry, "not
through incapacity but on account of the bad tendency

CHILE 199

of their studies." Herein he referred to Bello's gram-
matical teaching, for the latter had opposed a proposition
of Sarmiento*s that orthography should conform to pro-
nunciation, with the statement that young men should
study good Castilian models, so that their language might
not degenerate as among "another American people into
a Spanish-Gallic dialect/* Sarmiento met this fling by
declaring that "the Argentines had written more verses
than the tears they had shed over the sad fate of their
country." Moreover, "the influence of grammarians,
respect for models, and fear of breaking rules" brought
about a lack of spontaneity of ideas.

The young Chileans rallied to the defense of Bello's
methods by founding a periodical. El Semanario Literario,
in which to print their polemics and their literary produc-
tions. The most important contributors were Salvador
Sanfuentes, Bello's sons Francisco and Carlos, and J. J.
Vallejo. The topic of discussion was nominally roman-
ticism. The Argentine V. F. Lopez published a long
article about it and Andres Bello reviewed the romances
of the Duque de Rivas. He also printed translations of
two poems by Victor Hugo, entitled in Spanish J Olimpio
and Las Fantasmas; the latter is the well-known poem
beginning, "Helas! que j'en ai vu mourir de jeunes filles!"
To Lopez* article Sanfuentes replied that romanticism
was not well understood in Chile; besides it was going
out of fashion in Europe. In its place he urged "faithful
pictures of life." In illustration he began the publication
of his long poem. El Campanario.

In the theater, a translation of Hugo's Angela was pro-
duced as an example of the romantic drama. Other

200 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

translations followed. Then Carlos Bello (1815-54),
wrote a piece in two acts, Los Amores del Poeta which
was welcomed with great applause. A month later Rafael
Minvielle (1800-87), P^t on the boards Ernesto, which
was praised by Sarmiento as superior to the former.
Minvielle also translated Hernani and Dumas' Antony.
Juan Bello (1825-60), likewise made translations of ro-
mantic dramas and attempted to rival Sanfuentes in a
poetic legend, Elena y Eduardo,

Satirical treatment of the controversy was undertaken
by Jose Joaquin Vallejo (1809-58), who poked fun at
romanticism by saying that "it was the cheapest thing
that had come to Chile from Europe by way of the Rio
de la Plata." And as original productions under the now
famous pen name of "Jotabeche," he wrote sketches of
manners and customs in the mining camps of Chile. These
vivid pictures of the landscape and the miners, their
dances and fights, the vivacious record of their conversa-
tions and the satirical account of their superstitions form
one of the classics of Chilean literature.

In his story of the literary controversy J. V. Lastarria,
in his Recuerdos Literarios, is inclined to deny Andres
Bello's leadership, and attributes its origin and bitterness
to the eflPorts of the young men to outshine the Argentines
in the drawing rooms of Santiago by the declamation of
original compositions in verse, and to the poetical con-
test of 1842, promoted by the society of which he was
president. La Sociedad Literaria.

Whatever its origin the best fruit of the controversy
was the establishment of the University of Chile, of which
Andres Bello was installed as rector, September 17th, 1843.

CHILE 20I

And a month later he brought to a climax his part in the
controversy by publishing La Oracion por Todos. This
poem is not a translation but an adaptation of Victor
Hugo's La Priere pour tons; "strongly Castilian" ac-
cording to Menendez y Pelayo, "in which Bello seizes
the original thought and develops it in our language
in conformity with our lyrical habits; and he accom-
plishes this in such fashion that La Oracion por Todos
is known by everybody in America and considered by
many as Bello's best poem. There is no Spaniard
who reads those melancholy and sobbing strophes and
again looks at the French text without finding it very
inferior." ^

To the setting of the poem, the landscape bathed in
evening twilight, Bello added certain features essentially
Spanish, the old tower, the isolated farmhouse and the
church. On the moral side he urges a prayer for Spanish
types of sinners. And while the French poem is not
specific in its invocation for the dead, Bello pleads for
"My Lola." Death being an ever present preoccupation
of the Spanish mind, Bello widens the scope of the argu-
ment for kind thoughts toward the dead in this wise:
"I too at no distant day shall be a guest of the dark house
and shall invoke the prayer of a pure soul."

After Bello*s installation as rector of the University of
Chile his poetical production was slight, a few transla-
tions, fables and verses for ladies' albums. He was oc-
cupied with his professional labors and the preparation
of his scientific works which served as text-books. The
names of a few suffice to show the wide variety of his
learning: Teoria del Entendimiento, 1843; Proyecto del

202 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Codigo civil, 1843; Principios de Derecho internacionaly
1844; Gramdtica de la Lengua castellana, 1847.

As secretary of the University of Chile, was chosen
Salvador Sanfuentes (1817-60), in some ways Bello's
most distinguished pupil. At the age of sixteen he wrote
an imitation in verse of Racine's Iphigenie, which Bello
printed in the Araucano. In 1836 he became secretary
to the Chilean legation in Peru, in 1843 general secretary
to the University. From 1847 to 1851 he was a member
of President Bulnes' cabinet, first as minister of justice
and later of state. As a member of the House of Deputies
he was considered brilliant, while he was also acknowledged
to be an able practitioner of law. In 1853 he resigned his
position as secretary of the University, but became its
dean in 1856. Appointed a judge of the Supreme Court,
1858, he held this position until his death.

Throughout his political career, his interest in poetry
never failed. His enemies could find nothing worse than
to call him the author of El Campanario, which he wrote
at the age of twenty-four, in order to demonstrate so
valiantly to the carping Argentines that poets did exist
in Chile. His purpose, moreover, was to prove the su-
periority of real pictures of life over the fancies of roman-
ticism. The poem is written in three cantos. The scene
is laid in Santiago about the middle of the eighteenth
century. A marquis proud of his nobility has two chil-
dren, Cosme and Leonor. To this family is introduced
by the president of Santiago, Don Antonio de Gonzaga,
a young Captain Eulogio to whom he owes his life. But
the latter, being of plebeian birth, is not favored by the
parents of Leonor. As long as the president lives, Eulogio's

CHILE 203

suit for the young lady's hand prospers; but when Don
Antonio suddenly dies, Captain Eulogio is turned away
from the marquis' house. The young man, however,
persuades Leonor to elope with him during the favorable
opportunity presented by Holy Week. Their marriage
is in progress in the chapel of a neighboring town when
her father and his slaves appear and interrupt the cere-
mony. Eulogio, unwilling to injure the father, does not
defend himself from arrest. Loaded with chains he is
tried for abduction and banished. That night, however,
he escapes from prison. A few days later, a letter con-
taining four letters traced in blood, of which only Leonor
understands the meaning, is brought to her together with
a portrait. She retires to a convent. One moonlight
night the nuns are awakened by an unseasonable ringing
of the bells. Ascending the belfry they find there hanged
the hapless Leonor. The poem contains descriptions of
ancient customs, especially of the royal court of justice,
the celebrations of Holy Week, the ni^nery and the tak-
ing of the vows by the novice. The episodes possess a
real interest and the whole poem, written in a variety of
meters, has a fresh and animated style.

In 1850 Sanfuentes published as a collection in one
volume, two other legends and his romantic drama, Juana
de Ndpoles. The legend entitled El Bandido, opens with
a scene on a mountain where a negro bandit, Fernando, a
man who had sworn to avenge the wrongs of his race, is
feasting with his followers. With him is Maria who had
yielded to Fernando to save her father's life after she had
been carried off from her village just as her wedding to
Anselmo was being celebrated. As the feast progresses,

204 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

the bandits perceive clouds of smoke arising from the
forest, which warns them of the approach of a band of pur-
suers led by Anselmo. When they come up, the latter fights
with Fernando, but is severely wounded and defeated.
Maria, however, persuades Fernando that Anselmo is
her brother and so is allowed to nurse him back to health.
She confesses to him her disgrace, whereat Anselmo
scorns her. That night coming to him, with the statement
that she has taken poison, she falls dying at his feet.
Anselmo calls Fernando and they fight. Anselfho, how-
ever, is again beaten and falls beside Maria's corpse whose
hand he clasps in his last moments. Fernando, kicking
their hands apart, leaves them, breaks camp and sur-
renders to the authorities, who execute him.

Superior to this poem is Inami 6 la Laguna de Ranco,
Alberto has fled from the Chilean city of Valdivia because
he has killed a superior in a duel. He escapes his pursuers
by taking refuge on an island in the lake of Ranco. Falling
in love with Inami, the beautiful daughter of the Indian
cacique Colpi, he marries her and a son is born to them.
One night Alberto saves from the waters of the lake an
old man, Alejo, who proves to be his father, come in search
of him. Alejo is angry when he learns that Alberto has
married Inami and demands that he leave her and return
to Valdivia. The young man refuses, but in his distress at
being obliged to choose between his wife and his father,
exhibits some coolness to the former. Their suspicions
aroused, the Indians kill Alejo. Beside his corpse, Alberto
finds a dagger which he recognizes to be Colpi's. The
Indian when confronted admits his guilt; in the ensuing
fight Alberto kills his father-in-law on the top of a cliff

\

CHILE 205

whence he throws the body into the lake. Alberto ob-
tains a canoe in preparation for removing his father's
body. As he is about to start, Inami, with her child,
appears at the top of the clifF. Beckoning to her husband,
she plunges into the water to swim toward the canoe.
About to reach it, she strikes against Colpi's body. Then
with a cry of horror, she places her child in the canoe,
turns back to embrace her father's corpse and sinks with
it to her own death.

Sanfuentes admitted his indebtedness to that old epic
of Chilean history, Ercilla's Araucania. He succeeded
fairly well in making his Indians natural and in exhibiting
their sentiments of hospitality toward strangers. Es-
pecially interesting, however, is his description of the city
of Valdivia.

His drama, J nana de Ndpoles, derived its story from
Sismondi. Roberto, king of Naples, had usurped the
throne from his nephew, Carlos Huberto, king of Hungary.
Roberto determines to bring about a reversion of the
throne by arranging a marriage between Andres, the
second son of Carlos, and his own daughter Juana, at the
time seven and five years old respectively. Their parents
dying when he is eighteen and she sixteen, the young
couple are left to adjust their differences and difficulties
according to their own notions. Juana, holding that a
papal bull had legitimized the usurpation, wishes to in-
herit her father's dominions while Andres asserts a supe-
rior right. The dramatist complicated their quarrels by
introducing a love affair between Juana and a certain
Luis de Tarento and thus made more tragic Andres'
death at the hands of conspirators.

2o6 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

The poetic rendering of a legend again occupied San-
fuentes* attention in 1853. He found the material in
Olivares' Historia Militar. Huentemagu, an Araucanian
Indian, received as his share of the sack of a nunnery a
beautiful nun. With her he fell so much in love that she
was able to persuade him not only to respect her but also
to restore her to her fellow countrymen; whereupon he
followed her and became a servant at the nunnery in
order to be near the object of his adoration.

Four years later from the same pen came Ricardo y
Lucia 6 la Destruccibn de la Imperial, comprising 17,626
hendecasyllabic verses in octaves. This is a tale of love
between a Spaniard and an Indian maid, thwarted by
the jealousy of a disappointed lover who assists a con-
spiracy to raid the city of La Imperial. The actors all
perish in the tumult of its destruction. Somewhat differ-
ent in character is Sanfuentes' last work of which he pub-
lished four parts before his death. Teudo 6 Memorias de
un solitario purports to be the diary in verse of the impres-
sions of a solitary monk.

The poetic merit of Sanfuentes' compositions varies
greatly. The later ones become monotonous from ex-
cessive description. Though he lacks at times dramatic
force and psychological truth, he never fails in a feeling
for nature. He has written more verses than any other
Chilean and though the first to sing the beauties of primi-
tive nature in Chile, no other poet in this respect has
equalled Sanfuentes.

The poetic activity in Chile about 1842 was not entirely
devoid of the classical note which sought perfection of
form. Even in El Semanario were published poems of

CHILE

207

that type by Hermogenes de Irisarri, a Guatemalan,
whose father, Antonio Jose de Irisarri, a very wealthy
man, had played an important part in Spanish-American
affairs during the revolutionary period. Another poet of
classical leanings was Jacinto Chacon, who continued to
an advanced age to occupy high positions in Chilean
politics. As a leader the classical school may have looked
to Felipe Pardo who came to Chile as Peruvian envoy in

1836. A pupil of the celebrated Sevillan Alberto Lista
and an enthusiastic man of letters, he wrote much and
even published a periodical. El Interprete, during hisy
sojourn in Chile.

In some respects the most successful writer of occa-
sional verse of classical type during this epoch was Dona
Mercedes Marin de Solar (1804-66). Being a bright
child she was given an excellent education, contrary to
the prevailing notions about female education. She even
knew French, which is remarkable for it is on record that
in 1 82 1 a priest refused to absolve a young woman be-
cause she was studying that language. Dona Mercedes
came into public notice by her Canto a la Muerte de don
Diego Portales, printed by Bello in the Jraucano, July,

1837. This composition of three hundred and twenty-
four lines was the work of a single night, and reflects as a
historical document in verse the social conditions of the
time. Her numerous pieces concern mainly events in
family life bearing such titles as. To my daughter Luisa
on the death of her husband; To my daughter Elena on
her departure for North America; To my daughter Caro-
line on going to live in the country. Recollecting in her
dying hours that she had written no verses for her youngest

208 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

daughter Matilda, she composed a sonnet remarkable
under the circumstances for containing no hint of death
or separation and speaking only of the joy with which
the daughter had blessed her mother.

Owing to the character of the race poetry has been
more of a forced product in Chile than in some other
Spanish-American countries, though versifiers have been
numerous. The upper class of this race is composed of
Spaniards largely of Basque origin, somber and practical,
with an element of Anglo-Saxon merchants and sailors.
The lower class differs from that of other South-American
republics because their aboriginal ancestors, the Arau-
canians, were not submissive but warlike and difficult
to conquer. Furthermore there are no Africans nor
Asiatics. The geography of the land also contributes
to homogeneity of race. A narrow strip of coast walled on
the east by a range of lofty and almost inaccessible moun-
tains, the sea affords easy communication between its
parts. Shipping, mining, and agriculture in the numerous
valleys in a climate favorable to labor by white men thus
become its natural industries.

The same conditions explain the type of government
projected by Diego Portales and adopted in the constitu-
tion of 1833. This gave the balance of power to an oli-
garchy of the landholders represented by senators whose
term of office was nine years and a president elected for
ten years. In the struggle which preceded the victory of
the patrician conservatives, they were called "pelucones"
by the liberals who in turn were dubbed "pipiolos."
The strong rule of the "pelucones" preserved Chile from
the anarchy which held back the progress of the other

CHILE 2C9

republics. But the descendants of the "pipiolos" kept
alive and developed a liberalism, as the years passed, which
found an expression not only in literature but also in
arrned uprisings.

The constitution of Portales made the church an in-
stitution of state because the church stood for order
and the defense of property; in return the church sup-
ported the temporal power of the oligarchy. Against
the union of church and state came the first attack of
Hberalism, Francisco Bilbao's (1823-65), Sociahilidad chi-
lena, a book of great literary and social importance in
the history of Chile. It was first printed in the short-
lived periodical El Crepusculo, 1844. The journal was
suppressed and the author was prosecuted by the eccle-
siastical authorities, who accused him of blasphemy, im-
morality and sedition because Bilbao attributed the ex-
tremely wretched condition of the working class in Chile
to the domination of the clergy. The ecclesiastical tri-
bunal found Bilbao guilty and sentenced him to pay a
fine of fifteen hundred pesos or in default of its payment
to serve six months in prison. His friends promptly
subscribed the money and sufficient additional funds
to allow him to leave the country. In Sociabilidad chilena
a Chilean writer, Isidoro Errazuriz, sees the outcome of
Andres Bello*s philosophical teaching, not in its substance
but as a "wild plant" that grew in the intellectual ground
prepared by his hand.

Isidoro Errazuriz, by the way, was a clever journalist
and a brilliant orator whose political activity extended
from i860 to 1890. As a historian he published an im-
portant sketch of the political parties in Chile from 1823

2IO LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

to 1870 as an introduction to his extensive Historia de la
Administracion Errdzuriz.

Francisco Bilbao went by way of Buenos Aires to Paris
where he made the acquaintance of Michelet and Edgar
Quinet. The latter, after reading Bilbao's book con-
gratulated him. Quinet, the philosopher of democracy,
was then producing his own works against the influence
of Catholicism in the modem world. When Bilbao re-
turned to Chile, he established, on the basis of Quinet*s
ideas, a liberal society with the name of La Sociedad de
la Igualdad. To it were attracted many liberal thinkers.

One of the most prominent was Eusebio Lillo (1826-
1910). At the age of eighteen he attracted attention by
winning a prize for verses on Jose M. Infante, a popular
hero. Three years later he was honored by the adoption
of a poem of his as the national anthem of Chile. The
older one by De Vera was displaced because its virulent
hostility to Spain seemed antiquated. In 1848 he was
one of the founders of the Revista de Santiago^ a somewhat
notable periodical for it united as collaborators under
the leadership of J. V. Lastarria many important men
of letters. To this magazine Lillo's first contribution
was a legend. Loco de Amor, in two cantos.

Lillo now became interested in politics, supporting the
ideas of Francisco Bilbao by editing a journal. El Amiga
del Pueblo. And as a rallying song for his party he wrote
a Himno de la Igualdad. Words led to deeds in the liberal
insurrection of 1851. Lillo took part in the fighting in
the streets of Santiago. After this affair he was banished
and took refuge in Peru.

His experiences in that country Lillo incorporated in a

CHILE 211

long poem, Fragmentos de los Recuerdos de un ProscritOy
generally considered his best poem on account of its inter-
esting description of Lima. Lillo's verses give evidence
of a delicate feeling for the softer moods of nature. He
was fond of flowers and wrote so much about them that
he was called the poet of the flowers. In a simple style
which found imitators he sang the perfume of the mignon-
ette and the pale and drooping calyx of the flowering
rush. Even in the Himno Nacional he remembered the
flowers of Chile and expressed the hope that the invader
might never trample them down.

On reaching middle life Lillo applied his poetic imagi-
nation to the problems of speculative business. In Bolivia
he embarked on various enterprises by supplying capital
to miners. As a result he returned to his native Chile a
wealthy man at the age of fifty-two. Once more in poli-
tics he was elected alcalde of Santiago. Under President
Balmaceda of liberal tendencies he held various high
governmental oflftces. And when the latter committed
suicide in 1891, Lillo was the executor of his will.

A poet of a more purely romantic type than Lillo was
Guillermo Blest Gana (i 829-1 904). His poems and
sonnets say little of nature but treat intimately of his
feelings. The romantic pose of his lines was not justified
by the material circumstances of his life. Nevertheless
he made Alfred de Musset his model. Not only did he
translate the Nuit de mat but imitated it in twenty-three
compositions which are grouped under the title of Noches
de Luna in the edition of his Poesias, 1854. With the
moon he converses about his love, her beauty and her
deceitfulness. Being a good reader he became a parlor

212 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

favorite with the ladies, who delighted to hear him read
his verses. His later poems reflect with fascinating
delicacy the spirit of Chilean home life.

In 1857, on account of political troubles he had to seek
asylum in Europe. On his return he became a professor
of literature in the University of Chile; then he entered
the diplomatic service of his country. While minister
to Ecuador he had an opportunity to enact in real life
something as dramatic as any of his poetic fancies. The
poetess, Dona Dolores Veintemilla de Galindo, slandered
unjustly in her wifely honor by a priest, committed
suicide near her child's cradle. At her funeral, unattended
by others because it was that of a self-murderer, Guil-
lermo Blest Gana was the only mourner and he attended in
full diplomatic dress.

Beside the poems of personal character, Guillermo
Blest Gana's literary productions include various poetic
legends. El Bandido, Las dos Mujeres, La Flor de la Soledad;
some tales in prose; and two historical dramas, Lorenzo
Garcia and La Conjuracibn de Almagro. The magazine,
La Revista del Pacifico, which he founded offered encourage-
ment to many of the minor poets of the day.

The following year, 1859, was marked by a revival of
literary interest in Chile. This crystalized into the estab-
lishment of a society. El Circulo de los Amigos de las
Letras, which inaugurated a poetic contest destined to
bring into notice a number of young men. This society
and contest was promoted by Jose Victorino Lastarria
(1817-88), the former president of the Sociedad Literaria
in 1842. For his activities of this kind (he was also a prime
mover in founding the Academia de Bellas Letras in 1873),

I

CHILE 213

and his many journalistic enterprises, he has been called
the "father of literary development in Chile." The major
part of his writings, such as the somewhat visionary Lee
clones de Politica positiva, were political, but his sketches
and tales, partly autobiographical of his political career,
collected in the volume Antano y Hogano, form a classic
of Chilean literature. No less valuable for literary history
is his Recuerdos Liter arios.

The general tone of the verses submitted for the con-
test of 1859 was that of romantic melancholy such as G.
Blest Gana had made popular. A protege of his, Martin
Jose Lira (1833-67), gave it an original turn by drawing
his inspiration from the contemplation of nature. His
adaptation from Robert Bums, entitled A una Ave Heriduy
in which the bird reproaches the man for killing it, and
his translation of Longfellow's Psalm of Life are character-
istic of Lira's own productions.

The leading figure in poetic literature during the sixties
was Guillermo Matta (born 1829). His first work, Cuentos
en verso, printed in 1853, consisted of two long legends,
Un Cuento endemoniado and La Mujer misteriosa, which
smack strongly of his models Espronceda and Byron.
They are love stories with digressions and apostrophes
on whatever struck his fancy, Greece, Seville, Rome, Byron
himself. Their open attack on the conventional religious
ideas and prejudices shocked the Chilean public of the
day; but his lightness of touch with a happy combination
of jest and earnest made the poems attractive.

His literary free-thinking had a logical consequence
in his adherence to a political insurrection in 1857, on
account of which he was obliged to betake himself to

214 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Europe. In Madrid he made use of the opportunity to
print his writings in two volumes. The experiences of
travel strengthened his philosophical ideas and on his
return to Chile he expounded them with greater convic-
tion. In an address on literature when installed as pro-
fessor in the University of Chile, 1864, he touched on the
marvels of steam railways and the electric telegraph and
insisted that the new poetry must take into consideration
such changes in the state of the world.

The most copious of poets, his practice in this respect
made Matta the leader of a new school which praised
the love of science, adoration of justice, and respect for
industr}^ The improvement shown in his own literary
style gave evidence of his wide study of the leading French,
English and German poets. In fact the German note is
his special contribution to Chilean poetry.

Guillermo Matta*s brothers, Francisco and Manuel
Antonio, were journalistic champions of the same ad-
vanced ideas. The latter won for himself an immense
reputation in the Chilean congress. Guillermo supported
a movement led by certain ladies for the better education
of women. He even assisted Doiia Rosario Orrego de
Uribe to publish a Revista literaria for the same purpose.

Guillermo Matta's greatest popularity both at home
and abroad was achieved in 1866. At that time Spain
had seized the Chinchon islands oflp the coast of Peru and
was at war with that country. At the same time she
threatened an attack on Chile. Matta sent forth his
verses calling on all America to rouse herself in common
defense against the invader and they met a response in
many lands.

CHILE 215

One of the most stirring poems evoked by this war was
written by Dona Rosario Orrego de Uribe (1834-79),
A la Republica peruana con motivo de la derrota de la Escua-
dra espanola en Callao. The virile tones of this poem and
of other patriotic utterances are remarkable. Her verses
on mother love, on duty and to persons show the influence
of Matta. She began writing for G. Blest Gana's Revista
del Pacifico and in one of her early poems, A mi hijo Luis,
made certain prophecies of his future character which
proved true when second in command of the famous Chil-
ean warship " Esmeralda." It was a strange coincidence
that she died at about the very hour when he was dis-
tinguishing himself for valor in battle.

For correctness of expression and classicism of style
Domingo Arteaga Alemparte (1835-80) held first place
in this decade. His best remembered poems are a pair
of sonnets. El Llanto and La Risa, in which he maintains
the paradox "How often to cry is to be happy!" and an
ode Los Andes del Genio. In the latter the poet ad-
mires the Andes mountains as they rear their rugged
outlines above the smiling valleys; but there is a more
sublime cordillera, the genius of man. Like the rivers
from the mountains its influence streams through hu-
manity.

The brothers Domingo and Justo Arteaga Alemparte
were constantly associated in journalistic enterprises.
They contributed to the literary activity of 1859 by estab-
lishing La Semana. Several years later they brought out
El Charivari and La Linterna del Diahloy comic and satirical
periodicals. These opened a new vein in Chilean journal-
ism, for the serious and sober Chilean character has little

2i6 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

liking for Andalusian salt so typical of Peru. Domingo
Arteaga Alemparte also won fame as an orator.

In jocose verse, burlesque fables and satire, Manuel
Blanco Cuartin (1822-90) specially excelled, and his jour-
nalistic work during a long period was graced by his
humor. He wrote also two fantastic legends in verse,
Blanca de Lerma and Mackandal.

A companion in light satire was Adolfo Valderrama
(bom 1834). But his writings were not limited to verse
for he wrote amusing prose sketches afterwards collected
in a volume entitled Despues de la Tarea. His serious work
was that of a physician and professor of medicine in the
University. And he performed a service to the history
of Chilean letters by preparing a Bosquejo de la Poesia
chilena, 1866.

The martial lyrics of Guillermo Matta, to which refer-
ence has been made, initiated a fashion of heroic verse
which, assisted by historical events, remained in vogue
about two decades. In dramatic productions a parallel
movement occurred. Matta's friend and admirer, Luis
Rodriguez Velasco (b. 1838), the politician Carlos Walker
Martinez (i 842-1905), leader of the conservative party
and diplomat, the talented Jose Antonio Soffia (1843-86),
were the first to write in the heroic style. Then the war
which Chile fought with Peru for the possession of the
nitrate fields gave fresh impetus to the heroic, and brought
into the field Victor Torres Area (1847-83), Ambrosio
Montt (bom i860), and Carlos Lathrop (bom 1853).

In the theater Jose Antonio Torres Arce (1828-64)
produced in 1856 La Independencia de Chile, one of the
best Chilean historical plays. Since the action concerned

CHILE 217

mainly the exploits of Manuel Rodriguez, a popular hero
of the revolution, the lines were filled with tirades of
exalted patriotism. The author wrote other plays and
was a successful journalist.

The revolutionary hero, Manuel Rodriguez, was again
staged in 1865, shortly after a statue of him had been
erected in Santiago. The author's, Carlos Walker Mar-
tinez', patriotic tirades were enthusiastically received
and especially the finale of his drama Manuel RodrigueZy
which consisted of an apostrophe to the national flag.
During the next six years. Walker Martinez wrote a series
of Romances americanos based on colonial and revolu-
tionary history. Though composed in rather a prosaic
style they have been popular enough to call for a second
edition.

On the other hand, Luis Rodriguez Velasco used for
the material of his ballads the history of the day and
followed closely the events of the Spanish-Peruvian war.
Written at his post of observation in Peru the poems
gave evidence of keenness of impression. His experiences
also supplied him material for a legend in verse in six
cantos, Amor en el Hospital. In 1869 he wrote a comedy
of manners. For Amor y por Dinero, which his contem-
poraries hailed as the best produced by a Chilean author.
Ten years later when the war between Chile and Peru
brought the victory of the Chilean warship Esmeralda
over the Peruvian ironclad Huascar, Rodriguez Velasco
again greeted his countrymen with a paean of victory.

The daily occurrences of this war were celebrated in
verse by Victor Torres Arce. He was known to Chileans
for his sensual bohemian lyrics, some plays and a novel,

2l8 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Los A mores de un Pije, which scandalized the public of
1872 by its narration of erotic adventures.

But Juan Rafael Allende (i 850-1905), wrote with greater
talent the same sort of verse chronicle of the war in his
Poesias de " El Pequen" filled with patriotism, amusing
for their witty sayings, and entertaining by reason of
their pictures of camp life. By order of the secretary of
war thousands of copies were distributed to the soldiers.
At the same time Allende produced his patriotic plays
Jose Romero and La Generala Buendia. The latter's ex-
ploits were being narrated in fiction by the novelist Ramon
Pacheco. Allende, during the decade of the eighties, was
a fertile writer for the popular stage, depicting many na-
tive types. Among his dramatic sketches were many
bitter satires of the wealthy classes.

The most gifted Chilean writer during the seventies,
whose real poetic feeling and delicacy of expression place
him in the front rank of Spanish-American poets, was
Jose Antonio Soffia. Though his verses attracted atten-
tion when he was but twenty years of age, his best work
was produced after his appointment as ambassador to
Colombia in 1874. The cultivated society of Bogota
was very stimulating to his talents. There were written
his poetical romance, Bolivar y San Martin, generally
considered his best poem, and the twelve cantos of the
epic Michimaloncoy awarded a gold medal at a literary
contest held by the University of Chile, 1877.

This poem, based on Ercilla and the early historians of
Chile, related in a variety of meters the story of Michi-
malonco, the first Araucanian cacique to rebel against
Pedro de Valdivia. The trouble began when three Indian

CHILE 219

women murdered a Spaniard, Roque Sanchez. His be-
loved, Ines de Suarez, led her countrymen to avenge his
death. But the pleasing parts of the poem are the idyllic
pictures of primitive life, the love of the Indian maid
Guajilda for Michimalonco, her plaintive "yaravi" or
love song, their marriage by Christian rites.

Soffia's journey to Bogota by way of the river Mag-
dalena supplied him with the theme and the setting for a
pathetic tale in verse, Las dos Hermanas, about the
daughters of a fisherman who was drowned in a vain at-
tempt to save another man's life. In this as in all Soffia's
poems, the description of nature is unexcelled. In Acon-
cagua he sympathetically pictured the beauties of his
native province. In Las dos Urnas he rendered a tradi-
tion about the river Aconcagua and the city San Felipe.
Though love of nature inspired so many of his lines, love
for his wife and love of country, were also springs of his
muse. His patriotic apostrophes to national heroes de-
lighted his fellow Chileans.

The eloquence of patriotism was a more specialized
form of the grandiloquent verses on abstract themes
which were in fashion about 1880. Ambrosio Montt y
Montt, for example, who first wrote odes and sonnets to
commemorate the naval victory at Iquique, and the valor
of the Chilean commander Arturo Prat, easily shifted to
compositions in praise of art and the mission of the poet.

This fashion was an echo of the poetic activity in
Buenos Aires in the late seventies. The later roman-
ticists, following perhaps the example of Victor Hugo,
had a theory that poetry should serve humanity by in-
spiring it with lofty ideals. This school found its noblest

220 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

exponent in the grandiloquence of the Argentine poet
Andrade. In all Spanish America poets began inditing
odes to Humanity, to Science, to Reason.

In Chile, the first prize for the poetic contest of 1877
was awarded Pablo Garriga (b. 1853) for an ode Al
ProgresOy and again in 1878 for El Poeta. He was fre-
quently applauded for his contributions to periodicals,
for poems on such abstract topics and especially for an
ode, A la Ciencia,

Pedro Nolasco Prendez (b. 1853) openly acknowledged
his debt to Andrade. But he gave a note of originality to
his verses by the form in which they were conceived,
calling them Silhuetas when he praised the heroes of duty.
As Prendez was quite successful in catching Andrade's
lofty tone and wrote mainly after the latter's death, his
admirers pretended to see in him a reincarnation of the
Argentine bard.

Reactionary against the new philosophies, and a cham-
pion of the old religious ideals, arose Francisco A. Concha
Castillo (b. 1855). The virtues of the soul, of self-sacrifice,
of faith, the discipline of pain, as celebrated in his Dolor
Generator, were the sources of inspiration for his graceful
and fluid verses. A fantasy, Apoteosis, written in 1878
on the anniversary of the death of Cervantes, attracted
wide notice outside of Chile.

Metaphysical poetry gradually disappeared before the
style of writing brought into vogue by the Spanish poet
Becquer. In 1887 a wealthy Chilean, Federico Varela,
announced a literary contest to cover a wide variety of
topics, in both prose and verse. One prize was offered
for the "best collection of poems of the suggestive or in-

CHILE 221

sinuating kind of which the Spanish poet Gustavo Becquer
is the prototype." The jury finally divided the prize be-
tween two collections which proved to have been written
by Eduardo de la Barra (1839-1900).

He was a veteran writer, for at the age of twenty he
had won first prize in the famous literary contest of the
Circulo de los Amigos de las Letras, in 1859, by an ode
A la Independencia de America. Though he contributed
verses to periodicals for a while thereafter, he stopped
suddenly in order to devote his time to politics, and
political writing such as that contained in his investiga-
tion entitled Francisco Bilbao ante la Sacristia.

The Varela poetic contest again drew his attention to
the writing of verses, in which he proved himself superior
not only in the Becquerist rima but also in the fable and
in a discussion of the theory of Spanish prosody. In 1889
he published his poems in two volumes, to which he gave
the descriptive names Poesia Suhjectiva and Poesia Ob-
jectiva. Beside the prize-winning verses they contained
poems of passion, micro-poemas, and parodies of an early
collection of poems by Ruben Dario, Las Rosas andinas.
The micro-poema was so named by De la Barra from the
fact that it told a tragic tale briefly, even in so few lines
as a couplet. In the parodies of Reubn Dario to which
De la Barra gave the title Ruben Rubi, he showed him-
self a master of the jocose verse so rare in sober Chile.
By this wide diversity of form, De la Barra has proved
himself the most clever artificer of verse produced by
Chile.

The Becquerist rima was practiced by others than
De la Barra, for example, his disciple Leonardo Eliz

222 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

(b. 1861), whom he made the legatee of his manuscripts.
In 1887 Eliz published an interesting book useful to the
student of literature, Silhuetas liricas y hiogrdficas. In
this he appreciated in sonnets many Chilean poets and
added in prose a biographical note about each one.

Of the same age was Narciso Tondreau (born 1861),
whose Penumbras was published in 1887, through the gen-
erosity of friends enthusiastic at the true feeling for nature
displayed in his melodious though melancholy verses. The
contents of the volume were well characterized in a prefa-
tory poem by Rodriguez Velasco who urged the reader to
enter these "shadows" without fear if he possessed a love
of flowers, of leafy trees and the air of the woods.

The literary revolution known as the modemista move-
ment and dating from the publication in Buenos Aires in
1888 of Ruben Dario's Azul soon found recruits among the
young Chileans. Pedro Antonio Gonzalez* volume Ritmos
and Gustavo Valledor Sanchez' Versos sencillos initiated
the public into the new style. Francisco Contreras printed
in blue ink his Esmaltines, dedicated to the Princess
Zafirina and won notoriety by Rauly a long narrative poem
in verses of twelve syllables, showing the influence of
Baudelaire and the exaggerations of the symbolist school.
Contreras later went to Paris and continuing to write was
thus the only one of the early group to remain to the
present day a producer of literature. Antonio Borquez
Solar's Campo lirico offered flowers of poesy gathered
"apart from the beaten path"; his companions esteemed
most highly a joyous bacchanal song Jerez alegre and re-
printed it in their journal Pluma i Ldpiz.

When the Peruvian Jose Santos Chocano gave a new

CHILE 223

direction to the modernista movement hy his American
poems he opened a path more congenial to the Chilean
mind and conforming to the tradition of Chilean poetry.
Consequently Chocano called Diego Duble Urrutia "the
poet of Chile" when he read the latter's volume Del Mar a
la Montana, containing verses descriptive of the forests
and mines, and the native types of men and women and
their customs. In the same spirit Manuel Magallanes
Moure in Matices painted the splendor of the Chilean
landscape. Samuel A. Lillo not only sang the beauties of
nature in his Canciones de Arauco but also the wild life
of the mountains, the Indians, the hunting of the puma
and other animals; and in Chile herbico he evoked the
historic past from the days of Michimalonco to the fight
of the " Esmeralda."

The illustrated weekly Pluma i Ldpizy founded in De-
cember, 1900, is an interesting document for the study of
the modernista development in Chile. The young men just
mentioned who filled its pages with their prose and verse
were determinedly enthusiastic in their love of art. To
aid and abet them in their devotion they secured con-
tributions from renowned modemistas of other countries
such as Ruben Dario, Guillermo Valencia, and Fabio
Fiallo.

Other contributors and younger men were Miguel Luis
Rocuant whose Brumas showed the influence of the
Mexican Gutierrez Najera and a pantheistic turn of mind;
the even more philosophical Federico Gonzalez who sang
the struggle of the soul for the infinite. Victor Domingo
Silva having lived among the poor in Buenos Aires wrote
in a pessimistic strain about the outcasts of society in his

224 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

volume of verses, Hacia did. But in a long poem", El
Derrotero, he imitated Chocano. This poem narrates the
efforts of a young man to get rich quickly in order to marry
a wealthy girl. He attempts to find a mine of which an old
Indian had told him the location, but he is lost on the
pampa and dies miserably.

A review of verse writing in Chile shows that from the
time of Andres Bello and the introduction of romanticism
it has closely followed the currents of European literature
without producing more than a very few poets of first rank
among its numerous versifiers. Poetry may safely be
called a cultivated plant. On the other the genius of the
Chilean character reveals itself spontaneously in prose
forms of literature, especially historical writing and the
kindred novel.

The first novel published by a Chilean was El Inquisidor
Mayor o Historia de unos Amores, brought out by Manuel
Bilbao in Lima, 1852. It depicts society in that city
during the eighteenth century. Perhaps the author had
in mind his brother Francisco's recent persecution when
he described the evil fortunes of a young Frenchman
brought before the tribunal of the inquisition and con-
demned for his opinions. The novel portrays the wealthy
and pleasure-loving descendants of the conquistadores
disturbed by the first stirrings of the ideas which were to
have their outcome in the revolution. The impression
produced on the public was so great that the book passed
through several editions. This fortune did not fall to
the author's later stories Las dos Hermanas and El Pirata
del Guaymas.

Alberto Blest Gana (bom 183 1), the next novelist in

CHILE 225

point of time, is the greatest of Chilean writers of fiction
and in the opinion of Chileans the greatest of American
novelists. He aspired to be the American Balzac. In a
letter to Vicuna Mackenna, he wrote: "One day reading
Balzac I made an auto de fe in my fireplace condemning
to the flames my youthful rhymes. (He had published a
few narrative poems.) I swore to be a novelist or abandon
the field of literature. The secret of my persistence is that
I write not from a desire for glory but from a necessity
of soul."

His first stories published in 1858 were Enganos y
DesenganoSy El Primer Amor, La Fascinacibn and Juan
de Aria which immediately attracted attention for the
quality of keen observation which the author displayed.
Moreover, they aroused such general interest that the
University of Chile proposed in i860 for its annual literary
contest, usually limited to serious historical or critical
topics, "a novel in prose, historical or of manners, the
theme of which should be purely Chilean." The prize was
awarded to Blest Gana's La Aritmhica en el Amor. The
title is descriptive of the morals of its chief character who
uses any means to attain wealth and power. His selfish
conduct is contrasted with the self-sacrifice of his be-
trothed whom he abandons. Blest Gana's next novel, El
Pago de las Deudas, entered still more deeply into criticism
of contemporary society. And in Martin Rivas, published
1862, he produced his masterpiece.

The action of this novel takes place in Santiago about
the year 1850. Martin Rivas is a young man from the
country who is taken into the family of a very rich man,
Damaso Encina, who acquired from Martin's father the

226 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

mine which is the source of Encina's wealth. The novel
is a satire on the manners of newly rich people and the
vices of a lower class who ape the rich. In the Encina
family are two children, a son Augustine, and a daughter
Leonor. The son has just returned from Paris, wherefore
he interlards his conversation with French words and
fashions his conduct after a model learned in France. He
has a love affair with Adelaide, a daughter of the lower
classes. Her vicious and lazy brother, Amador, forces
Augustine to marry her by coming with a priest and sur-
prising him at night in her company. Martin saves
Augustine from this disgrace by proving that the man who
performed the marriage ceremony was not a priest but a
disguised friend of Amador. Martin becoming interested
in politics takes part in the uprising of 1 85 1 . He is arrested
and condemned but escapes death because Adelaide's
noble-minded sister, Edelmira, consents to marry a police
official in order to save Martin's life. Martin and Leonor
had been interested in each other from the first moment
of their acquaintance but her pride had forbidden her from
accepting his attentions. At last before Martin's clever-
ness and ability her pride yields and they marry.

The scenes and incidents of Martin Rivas, in spite of its
man)^ pages, are so many and so varied "tHat^tlie^ory
inoves^ rapidly. The types oLcharacter, according to the
Chilean critics, are true to iife.: the rich parvenue who
feeds her lapdog at table; the matron of lower class who
is ambitious to marry her daughter to the scion of wealth;
the worthless and dissipated Amador, a "siutico," as the
Chileans name the type; the politicians, "real beings," says
Barros Arana, "whom we all know."

CHILE 227

A different type formed the subject of El Ideal de un
Calaverdy published 1863. Abelardo Mannquez is a mod-
em son of a Spanish conquistador, a seeker after adventure
either in love or war, handsome, brave, quarrelsome,
ardent. His fate finally leads him into a conspiracy
which ends in his execution by a shooting party. Just
before the fatal discharge, he voices his ideal with the
words: — "Adios, love! only ambition of my soul!"

With this novel closed the first period of Blest Gana's
activity. He was sent abroad in the diplomatic service
of his country and lived almost continuously in Europe.
After thirty years he again essayed the writing of novels.
In 1897 he published a historical novel. Durante la Re-
conquista. The title refers to the two years following the
disaster of Rancagua, 18 14, when the Spanish army had
temporarily suppressed the revolution and the forces of
San Martin were drilling beyond the Andes for the ul-
timate victory. The author portrays the many leaders in
the guerilla warfare which filled these years and de-
scribes the customs and social diversions of the epoch.

In 1905 Blest Gana made a study of a South American
family as a type of those who endeavor to use wealth as a
means for breaking into aristocratic European society.
Los Trasplantados is a severe satire of every member of
the family Canalejas and their associates from their rage
for spending money to their peculiar jargon, half French,
half Spanish; from the married daughters' disgust at the
grandmother, who clings to her mantilla at church to the
exclusion from their society of other Americans except
a rich bachelor uncle, whose worn and unfashionable
clothes they tolerate, because they hope to inherit his

228 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

property. The youngest child Mercedes is compelled
to marry a Prince Roespinbruck, but she commits suicide
on learning that her husband has taken along his mistress
on the wedding journey. Even this tragedy fails to move
the family from their frivolity.

In 1 910 the octogenarian novelist put the scenes of
his novel of that year, El Loco Estero, again in Chile. As
in his first work his latest displays the same keenness of
observation and vigor of characterization.

The novels of Blest Gana's early period aroused a de-
sire in Chile, for novel reading. The eflForts of the peri-
odicals to satisfy it so stimulated original composition
that mention can be made here only of the most important
productions. Imitation of Blest Gana resulted in what
may be termed his school; but his imitators, led on by the
necessity of filling space in the daily paper, often spun
out exaggerated and improbable adventures. The custom
of selling novels in parts resulted in similar prolixity.
While the study of contemporary life was frequently
animated by a doctrinaire purpose, the search for sen-
sation turned to notorious crimes or the horrors of the
past. The model of the latter seemed to be the Spaniard
Fernandez y Gonzalez.

The most readable novelist among Blest Gana's im-
mediate following was Martin Palma (1821-84). A trip
to California at the time of the gold fever of 1849 gave
him a wider outlook on life. After his return to Chile
he edited a paper and wrote many tracts on social ques-
tions, which gave him a reputation as a free thinker.
In 1869 he published his first novel, Los Secretos del Pueblo,
The success which greeted it, helped on by the hostility

CHILE 229

of a few, induced the author to extend the length of the
novel to fifty parts, afterwards published as a whole in
four volumes. The introduction frankly states: — "We
have had in mind the improvement of the people. Our
customs are examined attempting to improve them, our
vices to correct them, our virtues to enhance them, at
the same time tilting full against our prejudices, against
our social and political errors, against our bad habits
for the sake of exalting the dignity and independence of
man."

In spite of the doctrinairism there is little declamation,
for the lesson is inculcated by striking pictures of vice
and its evils. The plan of the novel resembles that of
Martin Rivas. The adventures of two wealthy families
are contrasted with those of an honest artisan. The
wealthy hesitate at no crimes either to increase their
riches or to procure their pleasure, while the poor perform
the most extraordinary deeds of virtue or courage. The
wealthy young libertine Guillermo pursues the sister of
the carpenter Enrique Lopez to her ruin; in revenge her
father and Enrique get bodily possession of Guillermo
and brand him with a red hot iron on the shoulder. The
rich Luisa falls in love with the sterling qualities of En-
rique, but her family force her to marry Guillermo because
he threatens to divulge his knowledge of the skeleton in
the family closet. Guillermo finally dies in a drunken
orgy when the vapor of the alcohol rising from the spilled
brandy explodes, setting fire to the house. Luisa is thus
free to marry Enrique.

Palma later brought out a sequel to this story in La
Felicidad del Matrimonioy 1870. His anti-clerical tend-

230 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

encies were given full play in Los Misterios del Confesion-
arioy 1874, of which an English translation was printed
in London in three volumes under the title of Julia In-
grand — A Tale of the Confessional. These two themes of
Palma indicate the direction taken by a small army of
novelists engendered by the success of his work.

Of the novels professing a moral purpose Un Drama
Intimo by Moises Vargas possesses a certain interest by
reason of the portrait of its heroine, Eugenia, shamefully
deceived by the libertine Alberto. He falls in love with
Amelia Reynal and wishes to marry her, but her father
learns from Eugenia's own lips the story of Alberto's
villainy and repeats it to his daughter. New lovers
appear on the scene, Eduardo for Amelia and Ricardo
for Eugenia. Eugenia dies and Ricardo kills Alberto in a
duel. The other couple marry and live happily. The
local color of this novel places it relatively high in its
class.

Among the most successful of Palma's rivals was Liborio
E. Brieba. The original note of his very voluminous
work consisted in the setting of his novels. ... He
selected the early history of the revolutionary period for
his dramatic narratives. One of these, Los Talaveras:
novela historica (1814.-1^), has been several times reprinted.
The period is the same as that , chosen later by Blest
Gana for his Durante la Reconquista. Brieba also essayed
the fantastic tale as well as the exploitation of crime.

In the latter he was excelled in the next decade by
Francisco Ulloa whose Astucias de Pancho Falcato has
passed through five editions in Chile besides the reprints
made of it in Buenos Aires and Barcelona. It is merely

CHILE 231

one manifestation of the bandit literature common to
all Spanish-American countries.

The historical novel found many admirers and pro-
ducers. Ramon Pacheco began to write in 1875, and
brought out several novels before the Peruvian war.
That opened a new field of which he took full advantage.
The most important of his early work was El Subterrdneo
de los Jesuitas, 1878, in two volumes of more than seven
hundred pages each. The scandal implied by the title
preserved enough interest in the story to warrant another
edition in 1899. Of the novels dealing with the Peruvian
war, La Chilena Martir exploits an episode which oc-
curred just prior to hostilities while La Generala Buendia
fills two volumes with her heroic and patriotic adventures.

The masterpiece of Chilean historical fiction is undoubt-
edly Pipiolos y Pelucones, by Daniel Barros Grez (born
1839). This is a carefully planned reproduction in the
manner of Walter Scott of the period of the supremacy of
Portales and the struggles between the parties whose
popular names furnish the title. The characters more-
over are well developed and interesting. Barros Grez'
next novel, El HuerfanOy published 1881, though a series
of adventures in the style of Don Quixote, extended
through six volumes, has been termed a "photograph of
the Chilean people in their infancy.'* While the adoption
of the picaresque form allowed the author to penetrate
all classes of society and portray all kinds of character,
his use of an antiquated language imitating Cervantes has
not proved so pleasing. The main action of the novel
concerns a young man of obscure birth but of brilliant
talents, who, by overcoming a thousand difficulties,

232 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

achieves a fine social position and finally marries a dis-
tinguished lady. Marriage with her had been coveted
by an old man, very influential because of his intimacy
with Portales. The scoundrel being unable to win Julia
by fair means hires some bandits to carry her off. The
story of this attempt and its frustration by the astuteness
of Julia's father forms one of the most dramatic episodes
of the book. Imitation of Cervantes carried Barros Grez
still farther. In his last very popular book he strung
together a series of adventures in the city of Santiago as
the observations of his dog, published 1898, with the
title of Primeras aventuras del maravilloso perro Cuatro
Remos en Santiago. Barros Grez' talents for observation
and satire were also applied to the production of sketches
for the popular stage and a historical play, El Tejedor
0 La Batalla de Maipu.

The application of naturalistic principles in novel
writing, a more exact description of physical details and
a more careful psychological analysis was first made in
Chile by Vicente Grez (i 843-1 909). The same ability
at characterization which he displayed in Emilia Reynalsy
1883, and in La Dote de una Joven^ 1884, was shown in a
superior degree in Marianita, 1885. This is a tragedy
caused by the activity of match-making relatives. Mari-
anita is a simple motherless country girl who lives with
her father by the seashore. A handsome young naval
officer, Camilo, on a vacation, falls in love with her but
his relatives prevent his plans for marriage. Besides,
an ambitious neighbor, Dona Carmela, desires that her
son Sergio should marry Marianita. After an absence
of two years, during which Camilo had both married and

CHILE 233

been left a widower, and Marianita had been betrothed
to Sergio, Camilo returns to the village by the sea. The
old love between him and Marianita revives and quickens
into passion. After a time tiring of his relations with her,
Camilo one night fails to keep an appointment, and when
she seeks him out on the beach, searching for a pretext
to break with her, he calls attention to her engagement
ring. As proof of her attachment to Camilo, she promptly
throws Sergio's ring into the sea. But even such devotion
does not prevent Camilo from hearkening to his aunt's
plans for a marriage between him and a rich heiress. When
Camilo leaves the village, Marianita, filled with despair,
attempts to drown herself but is saved by a fisherman.
Her father in his perplexity at her conduct calls on Sergio
for assistance. When Marianita witnesses the young
man's real grief on learning her fault, she rushes from his
presence crying that she is going in search of her engage^
ment ring. Though Sergio pursues her, he is able to bring
back from the waves only her lifeless body.

Grez* next novel, El Ideal de una Esposa, 1887, was
greeted with enthusiasm in Chile by critics who believed
that he had produced a work of art worthy of Zola. Faus-
tina, wife of Enrique and mother of a sickly son, notices
a certain neglect on the part of her husband. Moved by
suspicion she hunts him down one night when he is spend-
ing his time drinking with women of loose character.
Thereafter she lives only for her son. Her love for him
keeps her from falling into the snare laid for her by a
doctor. When the son dies his parents are reconciled
beside his dead body.

Vicente Grez was not only a novelist but a literary

234 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

worker in many fields. . As a journalist he contributed
widely to the periodicals of his day. In this line he won
fame as an art critic. His volume of Becquerist verses,
Rdfagasy published in 1882, found favor with many. He
essayed also the writing of popular history, and for an
animated account of the famous victory of the Chilean
warship " Esmeralda " was generally known as the author
of El Comhate Homerico.

A number of minor novelists were contemporary with
the foregoing. Valentin Murillo began to write as early
as 1863, and continued to produce at intervals for twenty-
five years. His most noteworthy novel was Una Victima
del Honor, 1871, an attack on the death penalty based on
circumstantial evidence. Another novelist who had ad-
mirers was Enrique Montt, author of two studies of fe-
male character, Mujer y Angely a. tale of seduction, and
Laura Duverne, 1883. Of greater value in realistic de-
scription were the tales of Pedro Nolasco Cruz, especially
one entitled Esteban and his picture of country life, Flor
de Campo, 1887.

Alejandro Silva de la Fuente promised greater achieve^
ment by his Ventura, 1885, and Penas que matan, 1887.
In Ventura he followed rather Spanish or English models
than French by relying for interest, not so much on a com-
plicated intrigue as on observation of manners and psy-
chological analysis. Ventura is a young man, who comes
to Santiago from a small village where he is a leader.
Ambitious to rise he enters politics, and forgetful of his
village sweetheart, Margarita, he courts a rich heiress for
the purpose of using her money to further his plans. He
fails utterly in his courtship and his politics. He falls

CHILE 235

sick and, ashamed to return home, plans to commit
suicide. But Margarita and her mother who have been
informed of his illness come to Santiago. They take the
disillusioned youth back to his country home where he
marries Margarita.

In Penas que matan, Silva de la Fuente again studied
the character of a young man. Fernando in love with
Berta is compelled to witness her marriage to an old man.
For pique he straightway allies himself with Angela
Rosales. When, after their marriage, they pay a cere-
monious visit on Berta and her husband, love reawakens,
so that presently Fernando stops one day at Berta's
house, determined to declare his passion. The conse-
quent excitement brings on a severe attack of his chronic
ailment of the heart. As he falls completely unconscious,
it is necessary for Berta to call for assistance. After this
revelation of his soul to all the world, Fernando at the
end of a week's suffering is graciously removed by death.

The influence of President Balmaceda on the constitu-
tutional history of Chile also found an echo among the
novelists. During a period of ferment, Balmaceda had
effected many changes, even conferring on the Congress
powers which the old constitution had granted only to
the president. When, however, a dispute with the Con-
gress arose he was unwilling to yield the old prerogatives.
An uprising began in 1891 which he was unable to sup-
press. Finding himself thus in a position without a way
of escape except by flight or death he chose the latter.

The anticlerical agitation of Balmaceda's time found a
supporter in fiction, 1889, in Borja Orihuela Grez' El Cura
Civil. The scene is laid in a provincial city whose in-

236 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

habitants side with the old priest when the new func-
tionary arrives to supplant the priest in his duties of
conducting the register of vital statistics. The provision
of the law establishing a civil register which especially-
aroused the priest's ire was that permitting the official
to perform civil marriage. Hence arose the nickname of
"cura civil." One old inhabitant in grim humor even
sent to get "the blessing of the government upon their
union " a pair — of chickens. The young official, however,
is both wealthy and discreet. As a result of his conduct
he finally wins the esteem of town and its prettiest girl.

Of different type was an explanation of Balmaceda's
failure pubHshed in the form of a novel, 1 897, Los ultimos
Proyectos de Eduardo Castro by Rene Brickies. The book
aroused much discussion because the author attributed
the failure to the bad character of the soldiers who sup-
ported the president. Brickies drew a long and amusing
series of caricatures with considerable realistic power.

Balmaceda's constitutional changes threw the govern-
ing power into the hands of the plutocrats who had been
increasing greatly in numbers. In fact, a rapid increase
of wealth in Chile during the last quarter of the century
is an economic fact to be borne in mind. It appears in
fiction at the end of the last decade of the century.

Emilio Rodriguez Mendoza published in 1899 a short
novel, Ultima Esperanza. The idea of the author was to
show the evils brought into the country by bad French
novels. The Spanish critic, Juan Valera, in reviewing
the book declared that Rodriguez Mendoza had merely
imitated them, that his story might have taken place
in Paris as well as in Chile. In Vida Nuevay 1902, however,

CHILE 237

Rodriguez Mendoza introduced more local color. Then
Miguel de Unamuno inquired "why in these new countries
do they insist on depicting everything to us so corrupt?"
Rodriguez Mendoza replied that he had described a
genuine phase of life in Santiago, that "the evils come
from the fact that the people have tried to attain European
culture at one bound."

Vida Nueva concerns one Pedro who withdraws from
club life, its gambling, drinking, and horse racing, and
retires to write a few predictions of what he expects will
happen to his various acquaintances. He tells them on
taking leave that they will all end in poverty or the grave.
After an absence of four years, during which he receives
no letters or papers, he returns to Santiago. Contrary to
his expectations he finds that the sports and high livers
are not only alive but have advanced commercially,
politically and socially. Pedro's nervous system is so
upset that his physician orders him to an asylum for the
insane.

Luis Orrego Luco (bom 1866), who began his literary
labors by writing short stories and sketches of travel, is
a novelist of versatile talent. His Un Idilio Nuevo, 1900,
depicts that class of society in Santiago in which money
is the thing of greatest value in life. Before its power,
neither love nor duty can stand. His Memorias de un
Voluntario de la P atria Vieja^ 1905? is a historical novel
which puts before the reader both the state of society
and the important personages of the year of revolution,
1 8 10. His Casa Grande, 1908, excited much discussion.

Fiction in the form of the short story was little prac-
ticed in Chile, before the twentieth century. A virgin

238 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

field lay thus ready for the exploitation of the present
generation. There have always been of course examples
of a similar kind of literature so closely-^ltied that the
division line is hard to draw, namely, the descriptive, often
jocose, article of manners. But the distinction between
the descriptive article and the tale should be borne in
mind.

The earliest prose tales written by a Chilean were
those of J. V. Lastarria, collected several years after their
appearance, in a volume entitled Antano y Hogano be-
cause some of the tales were in the nature of historic
legends. Much later in time came the short stories of
Orihuela Grez and of Orrego Luco, whose longer works
of fiction have been discussed. Of the younger writers
who have sought to rival Maupassant, several are worthy
of mention. G. Labarca Hubertson and R. Maluenda
have portrayed Chilean country life and country people
in an artistic manner. Their men and women are real
beings with whose loves and sufferings the reader is com-
pelled to sympathize. The characteristic irony of the
Maupassant tale seemed the important thing to F. Santi-
baiiez and to A. C. Espejo. For that reason their stories
of domestic life though entertaining are not so thoroughly
Chilean. A master of the short story is Baldomero Lillo
whose two collections. Sub terra (1904) and Sub sole (1907),
interspersed with descriptive articles, reveal many classes
of the Chilean population, farmers, fishermen, the Arau-
canian Indian, children, miners.

The descriptive sketch which has flourished so widely
in all Spanish-American countries, on account of the
necessities of journalism has on the whole a less jocose

CHILE

239

character, less Andalusian salt, and more matter of fact
than elsewhere. The Chilean model has been J. J. Vallejo,
"Jotabeche," whose sketches are both instructive and
amusing.

Forty years later, Daniel Riquelme became his first
serious rival in the same line. Just as others were able to
extract comic verse from the war with Peru, Riquelme
found much material for humoristic sketches of military
life.

The palm, however, for humorous description of man-
ners must be awarded to Roman Vial (1833-96). Besides,
he was the favorite author of comic sketches for the stage,
from his first comedy in 1871, Los Extremos se toe an to
Gratitud y Amor in 1881. His Mujer-H ombre was awarded
a prize in a literary contest.

The legend or historical anecdote is a form of literature
made especially popular by the Peruvian, Ricardo Palma.
In Chile this form was cultivated by Enrique del Solar
(born 1844), son of the poetess, Mercedes Marin del Solar.
He frankly abandoned any historical purpose though he
borrowed from written or oral tradition the main facts
of his narratives wrought out with wealth of detail. For
example, Una Aventura de Ercilla, an anecdote from the
poet's life, gave opportunity to present the character of
the warrior bard against the background of colonial days.
Enrique del Solar also wrote several novels which won
applause at the time of their appearance. Dos Hermanos
won a prize in a newspaper contest in 1886. He also per-
formed a great service to literature by the editing and
publishing of his mother's poems.

Alberto del Solar (bom i860), began his literary career

240 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

by a legend Huincahual dealing with a love affair be-
tween an Araucanian Indian and a white woman, a topic
which allowed the author to present many descriptions
of former days. Alberto del Solar has spent a part of his
life in the diplomatic service of his country. His impres-
sions of South Americans in Paris are rendered in Rasta-
quoere, 1890. Of his novels Contra la Marea, 1894, and
El Faro, 1902, the latter is the more interesting. That
again treats of the exotic in the sense that the action takes
place on a distant island of the Chilean coast where ele-
mental passions hold sway in the little colony of three
men and the daughter of the keeper of the light.

From the legend to genuine history is but a step, and in
the writing of their history Chileans have excelled. The
striking characteristic of their historical style, the im-
partial narrative fortified by citation of original documents,
has been attributed to the influence of Andres Bello. From
the moment of his installation in 1843 as the first rector
of the University of Chile, he superintended the publica-
tions of the various faculties which were obligatory upon
their members. It was voted that one member of each
faculty should each year present to the university a study
of some topic in national history.

Of the vast result of such labor only this cursory men-
tion can be made. And it is possible to consider here only
those writers who have been most prominent by reason of
their copiousness. In this respect Benjamin Vicuiia
Mackenna (1831-86) holds first place not only in his own
country but in America. The sum of his published work
has been calculated at one hundred and sixty volumes
comprising forty-three thousand four hundred and two

CHILE 241

printed pages. Every epoch of Chilean history seems
to have been investigated by him, and the results of his
researches narrated in an interesting, almost popular style.
His favorite form was the biographical account of a leader,
a form which allowed full scope and play to the human
interest of the narrative.

Of a more strictly scientific form were the labors of the
brothers Miguel Luis and Gregorio Victor Amunategui.
On account of the similarity of their style it is considered
impossible to separate the individual work. It is certain,
however, that the interests of Miguel Luis, the elder
(1828-88), concerned literary topics and literary men. To
the brothers Amunategui the world owes the earliest gen-
eral discussion of Spanish-American poetry in their Juicios
criticos de algunos Poetas hispano-americanoSy written for
the literary contest of the Circulo de los Amigos de las
Letras in 1859. For the literary history of Chile the
biographies of Andres Bello, of Sanfuentes and of Camilo
Henriquez, and the researches in early efforts in letters
contained in the volumes La Alborada poetica en Chile and
Las primeras Representaciones dramdticas en Chile by M. L.
Amunategui are indispensable. Miguel Luis Amunategui
also took an important part in politics and rose to be
President of the Chamber of Deputies and a candidate,
though unsuccessful, for the presidency of Chile.

While the historical researches of other men dealt with
separate individuals or periods, that of Diego Barros
Arana (1830-1908) formed a comprehensive study of the
whole. Whatever he published earlier in life found a
summary in his final monumental Historia general de Chile.
After Bello, Chile's greatest scholar is undoubtedly Barros

242 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Arana. Objection has sometimes been made to his dry im-
partial style, but no reproach can be cast at the historical
accuracy of this last word on Chilean history.

The literary history of Chile owes much to Luis Montt
(i 848-1909), formerly director of the national library,
author of a bibliography of the older historians of Chile,
whose private library was purchased by a friend of Harvard
University and given to it as a remembrance of the Pan-
american scientific congress at Santiago de Chile. Luis
Montt's literary labor was diverse in character including
a volume of poems, a life of Camilo Henriquez and an
edition in forty-eight volumes of the works of D. F. Sar-
miento; an edition of Pedro de Oiia's poem El Vasauro
and the memoirs of Vicente Perez Rosales, entitled Re-
cuerdos del Pasado.

The assistance to the historian of such memoirs is con-
siderable. Important and interesting for the period which
it covers is Recuerdos de Treinta Jnos, published in 1872 by
Jose Zapiola (1802-85).

Encyclopedic in its thoroughness has been the labor of
Jose Toribio Medina (bom 1852) who has investigated the
history of printing in every Spanish-American country
during the colonial period. Equally authoritative is his
Historia de la Literaiura colonial de Chile.

Concerning the immense amount of historical writing
which has been produced in Chile no statement could be
more precise or illuminating than that of Jorge Huneeus
Gana in his Cuadro historico de la Produccibn intelectual
de Chile. "It is a very interesting circumstance for any-
body who tries to investigate the social traits of our people
to discover from the very moment of its independent con-

CHILE 243

stitution an extraordinary zeal for the patient investiga-
tion of our past. Each epoch, each administration, each
general, each revolution, has had its special historian. This
trait in itself reveals the seriousness of the Chilean char-
acter."

CHAPTER VII

PERU AND BOLIVIA

In Peru the period immediately following the expulsion
of the Spaniards was not propitious for the production of
literature. For twenty years incessant quarrels between
contending factions, the speedy overthrow of one dictator
after another kept the country in a state of anarchy, until
a strong man, Ramon Castilla (i 797-1 867), became pres-
ident in 1845. He reestablished order and prosperity,
introduced the first telegraph and the first railroad, abol-
ished negro slavery and the personal tribute exacted from
the Indians, set up a new constitution, stimulated foreign
trade; in short he ruled Peru with an iron hand for her own
good. During the fifteen years of his administration
literature began to flourish.

The principal figure in this renaissance of letters was one
of Castilla's foremost political opponents, Felipe Pardo y
Aliaga (1806-68). His activity, however, was largely
limited to journalistic satire, but his son Manuel Pardo
became Castilla's successor in the direction of Peruvian
affairs, being actually President of Peru from 1872 to 1876.
Felipe Pardo was sprung from the old Peruvian aristocracy.
His mother was a daughter of the Marques de la Fuente
Hermosa, while his father was regent of the royal audiencia
of Cuzco. Taken to Spain when Peru passed from Spanish
control, he became a pupil of the famous teacher Alberto

344

PERU AND BOLIVIA 245

Lista and even one of his favorite pupils. In 1828 he re-
turned to Lima. He signalized his arrival by a comedy
presenting national manners, Frutos de la Educacion, in
three acts. In this play are revealed the characteristics,
gay wit and subtle irony, which mark all his writings. In
fact these qualities in varying form, a modification of
Andalusian salt, give a peculiar individuality to all Peru-
vian literature.

Lima being the seat of the Spanish government in
America, the residence of the viceroy and the place of re-
sort for persons of wealth, there developed a distinctly
urban society with customs, ideas, and manners of its own.
Its love of pomp and display found satisfaction in bull-
fighting, in the theater, and in religious processions on
the many feast days. Its necessity for chatter, laughter
and gallantry gave rise to parties, picnics, and serenades to
the sound of the guitar beneath the balconies. Its love for
dancing came from its Andalusian blood; from its more dis-
tant Moorish ancestors the custom among the women of
covering the face. The ladies of Lima adopted the odd
habit of wearing over their heads a black shawl which
with one hand they held drawn about the face disclosing
only one eye. What havoc that one sparkling eye is said
to have caused in the hearts of youth! The girls, ca-
pricious and willful before marriage, became tyrannical
mothers of large families. In both men and women the
soft climate of Lima engendered an easy-going insouciance,
a frivolity of mind which took few things seriously and was
immensely pleased by the laughter-causing jest at any
trifle. For the kind of wit which could set a whole com-
pany in an uproar of laughter, as a spark can set going a

246 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

pack of firecrackers, they coined the term "chispa."
One successful writer of epigrams entitled his productions
"chispazos." Naturally there developed in such quick-
witted persons a special vocabulary.

When Pardo portrayed this society in his three comedies,
he could not deny free rein to his fun-loving disposition
but he so guided it in accord with his European education
and aristocratic breeding as to censure vulgar or immoral
tendencies. In Los Frutos de la Educacion, he ridiculed
the father who tries to impose a husband upon his daugh-
ter as harshly as he judged the young woman who loses
her sweetheart because she dances with too great aban-
don the "zamacueca." In Una Huerfana en Chorrillos,
produced in 1833, the fop, Don Quintin, who imitates
everything French, even speaking Spanish badly from
affectation, apparently a common type of youth, is not
permitted to carry off the young heiress, because morality
in the form of her two aunts interferes; nor do the manners
of the seaside resort where dancing continues till daylight
escape satire. Don Leocadio is another play of manners in
which Pardo thought to chastise by ridicule.

In 1836 Pardo was Peruvian minister in Chile and took
rather an active part in the intellectual life in Santiago,
even to the extent of publishing a periodical, El Inter-
prete. At this time were written some of Pardo's famous
letrillas. These are clever humorous verses without bit-
terness, composed merely for the sake of jesting on a
variety of homely topics, as his coat, a bathing suit, an
incident in the bull fight or the peculiarities of an in-
dividual.

After Pardo's return to Peru he placed his pen at the

PERU AND BOLIVIA 247

service of the conservative party. The cleverest of his
efforts appeared in 1859, when President Castilla was
promulgating his new constitution. Pardo edited a satiric
sheet, Espejo de mi Tierra in which he held up to scorn
those democratic proposals which grated on his aristo-
cratic nerves. To him the cry "Viva la libertad" was
the sublest irony, when liberty meant for the negro and
his former master equality before the law. In number
three of the Espejo de mi Tierra, he published a very
amusing parody on the new constitution. Article by
article he commented in verse on the various provisions
after this fashion. Citizenship : Property is not a requisite
condition; still one would advise the citizen to have trousers
and a shirt. Property: It is inviolable, except when taken
by the soldiers of the dictator. The manner of saying
these things in fluent verse adds immensely to the effect.
But of course in spite of their evident cleverness, Pardo's
political satires could not live beyond the occasion which
called them forth. They did, however, set the tone for
subsequent writers.

Manuel A. Segura (1805-71) was not Pardo's equal in
satiric verses but excelled him in the comedy of manners,
both in character drawing and in style. He has twelve
comedies to his credit. As he did not begin to write till
after his discharge from the army in 1839, his work covers
a slightly later period than the comedies of Pardo. But
both men described the same world of gayety and frivolity.
The girl who meets a lover at the window contrary to her
father's command reappears in Segura's La Moza Mala.
In Na Catita and Saya y manto the Peruvian type of Ce-
lestina, ready for any sort of errand or intrigue, holds the

248 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

center of interest. El Sargento Canuto entertains the
public with his account of the battle of Ayacucho and his
preparations to meet the Spaniards if they dare return to
Peru. The Lances de Amancaes, produced in 1862, stage
the occurrences at a picnic attended by half the popula-
tion of Lima. In these plays Segura proves himself a
better observer of native manners than Pardo and unlike
him cared nothing about inculcating a moral.

The contemporaries of Pardo and Segura who cultivated
lyric poetry were younger men. To them the spirit of
European romanticism came across the seas stimulating
them to ambitious imitation. But so foreign to Peru-
vian temperament was the melancholy pose that Ven-
tura Garcia Calderon ^ writes thus: "Read in succession
the works of the whole romantic generation in Peru seem
like the productions of a single author, so uniform are
their common lamentations. Imitating the same masters
with servility, they did not always succeed in expressing
their melancholy with individuality. And because they
confused lyric poetry with eloquence, a frequent con-
fusion with us, they exaggerated their accent. They
rivaled each other in disappointment. Each cried louder
than the other."

It is, however, not strictly correct to say that no dis-
tinctions between the poets exist. For example there
arose in Arequipa a whole flight of minor poets with an in-
dividuality as different as is the invigorating climate of
their mountain city situated eight thousand feet above
sea level in sight of lofty volcanic peaks, as different as
such a situation from that of Lima. The most important

* V. Garcia Calderon, Del Romanticismo al modernismoy page 105.

PERU AND BOLIVIA 249

of the Arequipans was Manuel Castillo (1814-70). His
first poem was indited to the tomb of the revolutionary
hero of his native town, Mariano Melgar. Castillo him-
self suffered banishment for participation in an uprising.
His poems showed a genuine feeling for nature. Es-
pecially did the verses Al Misti reveal that his soul was
filled with the majesty of the mountain that dominates
the landscape of Arequipa.

The majesty of nature again was the stimulus that
incited Manuel Nicolas Corpancho (1839-63), to his best
work. At eighteen he had written a drama El Poeta
cruzado. In 1853, when returning from Europe through
the straits of Magellan the sublimity of the scenery in-
spired him to compose a poem, Magallanes of epic form
concerning that navigator. The first canto described the
interview of Magellan with Cardinal Cisneros from whom
he obtained five ships; the second canto depicted the de-
parture from Seville; the third the death of Magellan,
followed by a "corona poetica," laudatory lines on the
great achievements of the hero. Corpancho also essayed
the heroic note in poems on the past of Peru. The Ar-
gentine poet Marmol who wrote an introduction for Cor-
pancho*s collected poems, Ensayos Poeticosy 1854, asked
him why he chose to write of the past rather than the
future. The question indicates the difference between
the outlook of the two countries represented by the two
men. Corpancho's praises of Peruvian greatness made
him popular. In i860 he was appointed minister to
Mexico. Three years later he met a tragic death in the
burning at sea of the steamship " Mexico."

The most genuine in his lyric grief because it accorded

250 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

with his natural temperament and circumstances of life
was Carlos Augusto Salaverry (1831-90). The impression
made on his youthful mind by seeing his father shot as a
rebel was never effaced. His melancholy was sincere when
his verses linked love and death. The theme of love,
particularly in the series of poems Cartas a un Angely
he treated with pleasing and unusual delicacy but with
emphasis on the sadness of separation from the beloved.
Loneliness and yearning for the distant sweetheart has
rarely been more poetically expressed than in his poem
Acuerdate de mi, brought to a climax with the cry from the
depths of his soul, "Remember me!"

Clemente Althaus (1835-81) was rather more of a
professional litterateur. For that reason he imitated many
different styles and passed from romanticism in his early
poems to classicism in his later verses. There is also a
heroic note in the denunciation of the Spanish fleet which
seized the Chinchon islands in 1866, a note inherited per-
haps from his father who was a general at the battles of
Ayacucho and Junin. There is even a hint of the native
Peruvian ironical jest. In his abundance, some six hun-
dred printed pages of verse, there are essays at the poetical
legend, as Justina and Carmen y Rafael.

A more philosophical poet who wrote from his personal
experience in life was Jose Amaldo Marquez (i 830-1904).
He tried to put the theory of the cosmos into verse by setr
ting up the atom and force as opponents. His scientific
turn of mind led him to become an inventor of a machine
to print with a reduced number of types, a sort of fore-
runner of the linotype. Attempts to interest capital in
its perfecting carried him to Buenos Aires and thence to

PERU AND BOLIVIA 251

Paris where he lived in extreme poverty. The pitiful
story of his struggles he told in Meditacion. His poem
A Solas expresses the resignation of a fatalist to the evil
of loneliness inevitably suffered by a poor man.

In Pedro Paz Soldan y Unanue (1839-95), his country
possessed a poet whose peculiar excellencies not only
placed him without a rival in Peru, but gave him a marked
individuality among the foremost in Spanish America.
The name "Juan de Arona" with which he signed his
poems was derived from that of the family estate situated
at some distance from Lima. And the beauty of that re-
gion appeared most minutely observed in his poems, so
minutely that critics have blamed him for trying to write
poetry about the common things of everyday life on the
farm. Though his first collection of poems, Ruinas, had
echoes of the romantic pose suggested by the title, it was
full of life and color, love of flowers and birds, whose song
he even tried to imitate as in the lines.

La ronca cuculi cuya garganta
Rompe con sus arrullos la espesura.

But his temperament was too healthily Peruvian to
be long depressed, rather on his blue days (as he says in
Los Dias turbios) he was inclined to rage like a hyena at
whatever vexed him and to delight in the misfortunes of
others. His state of mind was usually one which expressed
itself in jesting at everything and everybody. Most
wonderful was the amount of fun which he extracted
from an account in facile verse of a journey made by a
mixed company from Lima, twenty leagues into the
country. The persons in the cavalcade, the places and

252 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

incidents on the way all furnished him with ample ma-
terial for burlesque. At greater length he told in mock
heroics, La Pinzonada, the deeds of Admiral Pinzon. Or
he sympathized with the complaints of the wife of a mule
driver. If the verses of a poet signing himself "Roterup"
struck him as bad, he addressed the unlucky author
several Roterupadas.

As time brought disappointments to Paz Soldan, the
tone of his satire became more and more bitter till in the
periodical El Chispazo, edited by him, the acme of political
irony was reached. As if to relieve his mind by resort to
nature, without the gall which for him now pervaded
the Peruvian landscape, he busied himself by translations
of VirgiFs Georgics and extracts from Lucretius and Ovid.
In estimating Paz Soldan, however, the most intrinsically
valuable and interesting of his. works will always remain
the pictures of native life and Peruvian scenery in the
Cuadros y Episodios peruanos, published in 1867.

Wherever romanticism flourished as a fashion in verse
making, a translator was in demand. Such a place fell to
Manuel Adolfo Garcia, whose renderings of Victor Hugo
were popular in Peru. Temporarily popular also were
some of his own compositions both those of lyric character
and those with epic ring as the eloquent invocation J
Bolivar.

The last of the romanticists was Ricardo Rossel (1841-
1909). And he followed the spiritualistic ideal of Lamar-
tine rather than the sensual and pessimistic trend of later
French poets. His most notable poem, Meditacibn en el
Cementerio, written on a text from Lamartine, expresses
the hope that after death the great secret of human des-

PERU AND BOLIVIA

253

tiny will be revealed to him though he will be unable to
communicate it to a questioning poet who may come to
sit on his tomb. Like other Peruvians, however, Rossel
loved the merry laugh and wrote more than one letrilla
on a native topic. Historical legends too interested him.
One of them in verse, Hima Sumac, won a prize in a
Chilean contest, 1877.

One of the most widely known Peruvians was Luis
Benjamin Cisneros (i 837-1904), both because his pro-
ductive period was long and because he lived much in
other countries and contributed to their periodicals.
Moreover, the breadth of spirit in the kind of epic verse
which he cultivated lifted his poems from the narrow
circle of the merely local. As Peruvian consul in Havre
for eight years in the sixties, he made the acquaintance
of many Spanish Americans, an experience which gave
rise in him to a strongly Pan-hispanic feeling. This is
voiced in his Elegia a la Muerte de Alfonso XII, express-
ing a certain degree of real grief at the loss suffered by
the nation to which the Spanish Americans are bound,
both by ties of blood and by a common historical past.
While Cisneros' ode Al Peru in i860, was a romantic
outburst of grandiloquent patriotism, his fervid prophecy
of a glorious future, Aurora Amor; canto al Siglo XX, in
1885, was written in almost classic style.

Likewise a wanderer from Peru, Carlos G. Amezaga
(?-i9o6), derived his originality from his mercurial and
excitable temperament. In Mexico, the vehemence of
the verses of Diaz Miron pleased him so that with like
arrogance he threw out the challenge of an active rebel
against the injustice of fate. An admirer of heroism

254 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Amezaga celebrated its manifestations among the humble.
The most interesting of his poems of this kind is the in-
complete Leyenda 'del Caucho which in epic style exalts
the hardships of the poor Indian rubber gatherer in the
tropical forests. In Buenos Aires, Amezaga won a prize
with his meritorious Mas alia de los Cielos, in which he
voices the belief, despite assailing doubts to the contrary,
that humanity will be redeemed by means of scjence and
poetry. Amezaga was the author also of a couple of
dramas along the same lines as his verses, but they were
not staged and are rather too lyrical for presentation.

Another philosophical poet but one who, finding verse
too confining for his thought, adopted the essay in the
style of Montaigne was Manuel Gonzalez Prada (bom
1844). At twenty years of age he expressed his pessimism
by elegies to solitude, but being influenced by the anti-
clericalism of the Ecuadorean Montalvo he began to
attack religion till he seemed to many good people "an
agent of Satan in Peru." His radicalism finally developed
into anarchism, a nihilistic tendency to overthrow every-
thing existent. The essays in Pdginas litres fulminate
not only against religion but against such things as gram-
mar and orthography. In contrast to his demand for
freedom of style in prose are both the form and thought
of his later verses published with the title Minusculas.
In such highly artificial forms as the triolet and the rondel
he sings in mystic strain a happy humanity redeemed
from its present misery. As a professor of literature,
Gonzalez Prada is said to have taught a whole genera-
tion to write well.

In Ricardo Palma (bom 1833), Peru may claim the

PERU AND BOLIVIA 255

inventor of a new form in literature, the tradition, to give
it the name which the author himself employed. It is
nothing more than the historical anecdote, frequently
only a bit^ scandal, a sensational or unusual crinie, a
practical joke, just such things as appear in the newspapers
every day, but Palma's traditions were gleaned from the
historical chronicles of Peru. Though he vouched for
their accuracy they were written in such a vein of humor
with the striking points so skillfully brought out that his
critics accused him of falsifying history without suc-
ceeding in producing a novel. None of his imitators ever
quite caught the trick of style which made his work popu-
lar in all the periodicals of Spanish America for thirty
years. The inimitable was probably the dash of Peruvian
wit. Besides he ransacked so thoroughly both the oral
and written traditions of Peru that he left little in that
field for anybody else.

Palma, when scarcely twenty years of age, was banished
for participation in a political plot. Accordingly, in Paris
he published a volume of verse, Armonias, libro de un
desterrado. While it contained enough laments in ro-
mantic tone to justify the sub-title, the most original
poems were certain "cantorcillos" miniatures in verse of
his later traditions in prose.

In the first series of traditions, Palma, aiming more at
the historian'^task, related the acts of the viceroys;
but as the number of the series lengthened into nine
between 1863 and 1899, any sort of anecdote afforded
him material. Consequently he played upon a great
diversity of emotion from the thrill of horror to the broad
laugh, and introduced members of every class of society

256 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

from the viceroy to the slave. Being somewhat skeptical
himself, he delighted in stories referring to religious super-
stitions, belief in ghosts or tales dealing with loose living
by friars. At the same time he paid willing tribute to
heroism, as in the story of Fray Pedro Marieluz, who
died rather than reveal the secrets of the confessional
even when his political sympathies would have persuaded
him to do so.

But to excite laughter was Palma's chief aim. As an
example take the tale of the skeptical Andalusian shop-
keeper, who did not believe in hell. A fanatic priest
wished to buy some provisions of him on credit. The
man refused to sell, saying discourteously: " I won't
trust you in order to be paid in hell, that is, never."
The priest accused the shopkeeper of being a heretic
because he did not believe in hell and so worked on the
sentiment of the villagers that the shopkeeper had to flee
to save his life. The priest incidentally excommunicated
him. To lift the decree of excommunication, the shop-
keeper betook himself to the archbishop in Lima. The
latter imposed as penance marriage with a certain young
woman of ill repute, daughter of a famous vixen. After
the shopkeeper had been married a short time, he admitted
to a friend that the priest was right in affirming the ex-
istence of hell "because I have it at home."

The plastic character of Palma's traditions owes much
to his constant effort to culj the homely phrase or the
picturesque turn of expression from the speech of the
people or from old books. He put together some observa-
tions of this sort in his Papeletas lexicogrdficas, a con-
tinuation of Paz Soldan's Diccionario de Peruanismos,

PERU AND BOLIVIA 257

As a result of this careful documentation and Palma's
resolve not to inject into the narrative any fancies of his
own, jthe reader of his traditions feels that the vivid
picturc—jof colonial times and ideas possesses historic
value and is thankful that Palma has wiped from it the
dust oTages.

That more than one of Palma's traditions related in a
few pages of print might be expanded into a novel has been
indicated by Valera. But fiction by a curiosity of fate
was cultivated in Peru by women. This may have been
due to the influence of a remarkable woman of Argentine
birth, Juana Manuela Gorriti de Belzu, whose life story
equalled the inventions of fiction.

Bom in 18 19, at the age of twelve she emigrated with
her father when he was banished and lived with an uncle
in Bolivia. At the age of fifteen she was married to
Manuel Belzu, then a colonel in the Bolivian army, and
later one of the most noted if not notorious characters in
Bolivian history. Belzu being partly of Indian blood,
a *'cholo," he wielded great influence with the Indian
element so strong in his country. In 1847, when ordered
to take his command to the frontier, he started a rebellion.
Though unsuccessful he merely suflPered temporary dep-
rivation of his position for soon thereafter he was made
minister of war. In 1848, pretending to make an inspection
of the frontiers, he organized an uprising which put him
at the head of the government. As President of Bolivia
he ruled despotically for seven years. Driven out then
he lived in Europe for ten years, till in 1865 he returned
and started a revolution. Momentarily successful he was
assassinated in the presidential palace by his beaten rival

258 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Melgarejo who was accepted as president by the troops
assembled in the square below.

During Belzu's exile and after his death, his wife, Juana
Manuela Gorriti, lived in Lima where she became promi-
nent for she instituted a girls' school and edited a periodi-
cal. El Correo del Peru. As early as 1845 she had written
a considerable tale. La Quena, dealing with the history of
the Incas and the days of their splendor in Cuzco. She
continued to write stories mainly with a historical plot,
some of which were based on events in Argentina in the
time of Rosas. In Buenos Aires in 1865, a wave of popu-
larity in her favor was inaugurated by the editors of a
review who printed and sold by subscription a collection
of her stories with the title Suenos y Realidades. Since
then Juana Gorriti has been lauded in Argentina as one of
the literary glories of the country. In Lima where she
made her home for so many years her influence was very
great. No literary gathering was complete without her
presence.

For example, she arranged a magnificent ovation to
Clorinda Matto de Turner when she came to Lima in 1877.
Clorinda Matto, bom 1854, was a well-educated and tal-
ented young lady of Cuzco who married an Englishman,
Dr. Turner, in 1871. She wrote verses and articles for
various papers and attracted special attention by tradi-
tions in Ricardo Palma's manner dealing with her native
city Cuzco. Palma was present at the reception in Lima
and congratulated her. After his remarks and the reading
of various poems Juana Gorriti crowned the guest with a
wreath of silver filigree and presented her with a gold pen.
Two years after this ceremony at the time of the war with

PERU AND BOLIVIA 259

Chile, her popularity among her compatriots enabled her
to carry out successfully a public subscription to equip
a regiment of soldiers known as the "libres de Cuzco."
After her husband's death in 1881, Clorinda Matto de-
voted her attention entirely to literature.

In her writing as in her conduct love of country was the
distinguishing characteristic, both of the traditions of
which she published two series and of her famous novel
Aves sin Nido. The latter for its social importance has
been compared to Uncle Tom 5 Cabin. The Peruvian
novel written in picturesque style, portrays the wretched
condition of the Indian living in subjection to the exactions
of the governor, the parish priest and the land holder.

^^ Aves sin Nidoy' says the Mexican critic F. Sosa,^ "is a
book which the President of Peru and the head of the Peru-
vian church ought to learn by heart; the first in order to
learn in all its enormity the depraved conduct of the civil
oppressors of the Indians and the second in order to root
out the race of bad priests."

More successful purely as a novelist was Mercedes
Cabello de Carbonero. She may truly be called the one
Peruvian writer who has produced realistic pictures of
Peruvian society. In Las Consecuencias she studied the
evil of gambling as it develops in Peru. The frequent
revolutions originating in some politician's disappointed
ambitions are explained in El Conspirador, as well as the
moral and social degeneration of the individuals concerned.
Blanca Sol, published in 1889, is the drama of a woman of
society borne on to ruin through her desire to shine, her
bad education and the evil example of the world about
^ F. Sosa, Escritores y Poetas sud-americanos.

26o LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

her, a Madame Bovary in a Peruvian environment. This,
the most popular of her books, has passed through several
editions and been reprinted in many Spanish-American
reviews.

In the present generation of writers Peru has given the
world one of the dominating figures of the latest phase
of Spanish-American literature, Jose Santos Chocano.
Though his works have their roots in Peruvian soil their
fruits have been shared by the whole Spanish-American
world. They will therefore be considered in connection
with the modemista movement.

A few of his leading contemporaries in Peru should be
mentioned. Clemente Palma, son of Ricardo Palma,
having inherited his father's ironical ability, displayed it
in a field of his own selection. His Cuentos Malevolos
exploit the malice in mankind. Wherever he could find an
anecdote of a man who rejoiced in his neighbor's harm or
ill luck, he put it in artistic form, whether the individual
was a stolid Russian peasant who watched a peasant
carter's load of fish being jolted into the river without
warning him or whether it was Satan behind the cross
sneering at the dying Christ.

Of poets Jose Galvez has most shown the influence of
Chocano, but is more original in his erotic sonnets, and
poems. A melodic Conversion de Venus retells in epic form
with a curious mingling of Greek and biblical elements
the story of Mary Magdalen. To the erotic and musical
practitioners of verse belong also Juan del Carpio and
Leonid as N. Yerovi.

The novel, also of the erotic type, has been practiced by
Felipe Sassone of Italian parentage and by Enrique A.

PERU AND BOLIVIA 261

Carrillo; and with the same tendencies the realistic drama
by Manuel Bedoya.

Speaking now of serious literature Jose de la Riva
Agiiero has studied the Cardcter de la Literatura del Peru
independiente as well as the historians of his country. But
Francisco Garcia Calderon has won international fame by
his essays on contemporaneous historical or philosophical
topics in his Homhres e Ideas de neustro Tiempo and his
Profesores de Idealismo. Written in French Le Perou
contemporain was crowned by the French Academy; while
his Democraties latines de VAmerique is an authoritative
work in comprehensive form of the whole history of Latin
America. The latter volume makes clear the influence
in every country of the local politician, the demagogue, or
using the Spanish word, the caudillo, in stirring up the
mob to support him as a dictator. The problems which
face each country from the character of its population and
its geographical position are graphically outlined.

BOLIVIA

In colonial days the mountainous region beyond Lake
Titicaca was known as Alto Peru. As the Inca stronghold
Cuzco was also situated in Upper Peru some of the most
dramatic events in the history of the western continent
occurred in this locality. Not to be forgotten is the fact
that the famous hill of Potosi, which has yielded more than
two billion dollars worth of silver, is now in the Bolivian
province of that name. In the town of PotosT, which once
held 160,000 inhabitants but now dwindled to small
proportions as her mines have been exhausted, were heard

262 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

the first mutterings of revolution in Peru. And in the
province of Potosi almost the last remnant of the Spanish
forces in America was rounded up by General Sucre, the
victor at the great battle of Ayacucho, and compelled to
surrender in March, 1825. An assembly of delegates from
Upper Peru declared the independence of the region and
gave it the name of Bolivia in honor of the Liberator,
Simon Bolivar, whom they named perpetual protector
of the republic, and invited to prepare a constitution.
Under it General Sucre was elected the first president.
He was ousted from the presidency in two years and from
that time till 1871 nearly every president was a usurper
who ruled by force of arms.

The population of the country contains only about
twelve per cent of pure whites. And they, probably on
account of the climatic conditions on the high tableland
averaging above twelve thousand feet above sea level,
have never shown much energy apart from the exploita-
tion of the immense mineral wealth of the country. Con-
sequently the literary production of Bolivia has been
slight with neither a noteworthy journalistic current ac-
companying its succession of dictators nor a capital poet
whose work commands attention.

The romantic movement in literature, however, stim-
ulated three contemporaries to poetic effort, Benjamin
Lens (1836-78), Nestor Galindo (1830-65), and Daniel
Calvo (1832-80). The melancholy tone of Galindo*s
poems published under the title of Ldgrimas had its jus-
tification in his life, for he suffered proscription more than
once and was finally executed by a firing party. Calvo*s
first volume is described by its title Melancolias, His

PERU AND BOLIVIA 265

later Rimas contains some romantic legends, of which
Ana Dorset contains interesting descriptions. One of his
best lyrical pieces is addressed to Galindo.

Of a younger generation Rosendo Villalobos (bom i860)
has been an active writer contributing to the press of Lima
where he was a member of the Ateneo. Of his poems of
which he put forth several volumes Tic-taCy a mi reloj,
meditations caused by the ticking of his watch in the silent
night, makes good reading.

To the modernista movement Bolivia gave Ricardo
Jaimes Freyre who was associated with Ruben Dario. He
has lived all his manhood days in Argentina, however, and
is now a professor in Tucuman.

CHAPTER VIII

ECUADOR

The geography of Ecuador has exercised great influ-
ence on both its political and literary history. Its two
chief cities with their respective provinces are absolutely
diverse in character. Quito, the capital, is situated at an
altitude of 9,300 feet above sea level; Guayaquil, its sea-
port, lies amid pestilential swamps at the mouth of a
tropical river directly under the equator, one of the most
unhealthy spots on earth. Before the opening of the
railroad in 1908, the journey between the two cities re-
quired several days. As Quito was connected with Bogota
by an old trade route between the ridges of the Cordil-
leras, greater affinity existed naturally between these
two high lying cities than between the capital of Ecuador
and its seaport.

At the time of the expulsion of the Spaniards there was
a movement under the leadership of the poet Olmedo
to establish the province of Guayaquil as an independent
republic. But Bolivar succeeded in uniting Ecuador,
Colombia, and Venezuela into one republic under the
name of Nueva Granada. When this ill-assorted union
fell apart at the Liberator's death a Venezuelan general,
Juan Josa Flores, became president of Ecuador, and re-
mained in office for fifteen years. It was a partisan vic-
tory of this president that Olmedo sang in his last great

264

ECUADOR 265

poem. When Flores fell from power his successor at-
tempted to establish a government along radical lines,
but Ecuador was too conservative to permit it. Under
the leadership of Garcia Moreno the conservative catholic
element won complete control and set up a clerical dic-
tatorship.

Gabriel Garcia Moreno (1821-75) ^^st attracted at-
tention by his journalistic articles and his satirical verse
in the style of Juvenal. His epistle in verse to Fabio on
the wretched condition of his country assigns as a cause
the irreligion of the governing party. A mystic and yet
a man of action, Garcia Moreno summed up his whole
mental attitude and political policy in the sentence, "I
am a Catholic and proud to be one." As leader of the
conservative party, he welcomed the Jesuits when they
were expelled from Colombia and published a lengthy
political tract in two volumes, Defensa de los Jesuitas.
When he became president in 1861, he established a sort
of theocracy of which he was the secular arm, ruling with
absolute tyranny. If his enemies in Guayaquil plotted
revolution, he appeared so suddenly in the city with an
armed force that they were easily crushed. On the other
hand, to bad friars he was no less severe. For example,
a drunken friar was ridden through Quito on the back of
an ass, with his face turned toward the animal's tail.
But severity which results in the execution of many
creates embittered enemies. Of these, the most persistent
and able was Juan Montalvo whose journalistic attacks
finally resulted in the assassination of Garcia Moreno,
in 1875. Garcia Moreno, both from the point of view
of individual intelligence and of the extent of influence

266 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

on the affairs of his country, was one of the most remark-
able of Spanish Americans, and he differed from all in
the rigid character of his reHgious principles.

Juan Montalvo (1833-89), the ardent advocate of
tyrannicide, preferred his independence to all else. Though
President Veintemilla, successor to Garcia Moreno, tried
to buy his silence by political preferment, Montalvo re-
fused to be aught but a critic of the government. Though
a Christian who esteemed the Imitation the greatest of
books, he was actuated by the most intense hatred of
friars and the clergy. In literature he developed a style
unique in America and instinct with the best qualities of
the older Spanish prose. For that reason his Siete Tra-
tados, written about 1873, is one of the most widely known
Spanish-American books, but as a critic points out he is
more admired than read, because his qualities are such as
appeal chiefly to literary men.

The Siete Tratados are seven essays on the following
topics: — nobility, beauty in the human race (women),
reply to a pseudo-catholic sophist, genius, Bolivar and
Washington, the banquets of the philosophers (i. e., food),
and El Buscapie (the prologue to an unpublished book,
Chapters forgotten by Cervantes), Written in the manner
of Montaigne (Montalvo said he was moved to write
by "that pruritic egoism which made the old Gascon
celebrated") these rambling discourses full of subtle
irony and illustrative anecdote prove interesting reading
on account of the brilliant ideas and amusing turns of
thought on familiar matters. The author never neglects
an opportunity for a thrust at a friar or a bit of religious
superstition. To North Americans, his comparison be-

ECUADOR 267

tween Washington and Bolivar might be instructive. He
finds them both greater than Napoleon, because their
work still prospers whereas his has been destroyed.

After 1882, Montalvo lived continuously in Paris. He
attempted to found a quarterly, El Espectador, a name
borrowed from Addison's famous periodical, in which he
would discourse on current events in the style of his
Tratados; but lack of financial success soon terminated
its issue. He probably spent much of his time on the
Capitulos que se olvidaron a Cervantes ^ published post-
humously in Besancon.

So successful was he in copying both the style and
spirit of Cervantes that the book must be adjudged one of
the very best of the numerous imitations of Don Quixote.
One seems to be listening again to the sage discussions of
the doleful knight and his squire, though there is plenty
of Montalvo's own personality in such passages as the
following. Don Quixote is examining the treasures of a
village church. "The first thing which offered itself to
his eyes were some large paintings which represented the
principal miracles of the patron of the village. *This
happened in the Bay of Biscay,' said the priest, indicating
a shipwreck. 'AH the passengers were saved except those
who were drowned.' * Weren't they all saved then.?' in-
quired Don Quixote. *Not a third of them, sir.' 'And
those who perished, where are they.?' again inquired Don
Quixote. 'Wherever God may have put them. On the
canvas are only those of the miracle.*"

The dying hour of Montalvo is worthy of narration for
the phase it reveals of his strange personality. Having
caught a severe cold he suffered an attack of pleurisy.

268 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

which the doctors found necessary to relieve by a surgical
operation. He refused the administration of ether, be-
cause "on no occasion in my life have I lost the conscious-
ness of my acts.'* Though he bore the operation stoically,
it failed to save his life. An hour before death he had
himself dressed in his best clothes and seated in an easy
chair, saying, — "Whenever we are going to perform a
solemn act, or when we expect to meet a person of conse-
quence, we dress in our best. As no act is more impor-
tant than quitting life for death, we ought to receive her
decently." (The feminine gender of the Spanish words
for life and death, allowing one to speak of death as
"her," gives the point to the sentiment.) Montalvo at
the same time had given a silver coin to an attendant to
buy flowers to adorn his apartment. The price of flowers
being high in Paris in January, the man returned with
nothing more than four pinks, which exhaled their frag-
rance as Montalvo's spirit passed away.

Another native of Ecuador who attained a wide repu-
tation outside of his own country was the poet Numa
^ Pompilio Llona (183 2-1907). Bom in Guayaquil, he was
educated in Colombia and in Lima where from 1853 for
nearly ten years he was a professor of literature at the
college of San Carlos. He then spent several years
in Europe. On his return he lived chiefly in Ecuador
with periods of absence in the diplomatic service of his
country. While he wrote many sonnets and some pa-
triotic pieces, his most popular work consisted of long
poems with philosophical content, such as were the
fashion in Spanish America in the sixties; for example,
Los Caballeros del Apocalipsisy inspired by a painting

ECUADOR 269

which he had seen in Paris, Noche de Dolor en las Mon-
tanas, religious thoughts experienced among the Apen-
nines, and most famous of all. La Odisea del Alma, written
in 1864, so admired by the Argentine poet R. Obligado
that he wrote a poem to record his feelings on reading it.

This poem. La Odisea del Alma, addressed to his mother,
is a philosophical discourse on life. It begins by a refer-
ence to the idyll of childhood, its response to the wonders
and beauties of nature, his boyish plans for an education
in the classics. Filled with patriotic pride, strong, for the
struggle, armed with theories and maxims, the youth
aspires to intellectual triumphs. When he meets reality
the first effect on his illusions is indifference, but as he
continues to mingle with human society, his ideals break
on the reefs. The poem concludes by comparing life with
the combats in the Roman Coliseum in which the glad-
iators "fell with haughty expression and in a posture
artistic and gallant."

Of minor poets in Ecuador an anthology shows a decent
number. Of these the poetess Dolores Veintemilla de
Galindo waged an unequal battle for better consideration
for women in Ecuador. Accused unjustly by a priest
she committed suicide, and the only mourner at this
funeral of a suicide was the Chilean poet Guillermo Blest
Gana, then minister to Ecuador, who attended in full
diplomatic dress.

Other writers of verse were Honorato Vasquez, Julio
Zaldumbide (1833), and Luis Cordero (1830-1912). >^
Cordero*s lines struck a patriotic note with something of
the tone of the Argentine poet Andrade to whom he
dedicated his best poem, Aplausos y Quejas. Zaldumbide

^•^o LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

was a lover of Byron's poems and translated Lara. Though
the philosophic strain predominated in La Eternidad de
la Vida and the Canto a la Musica, his Soledad del Campo
revealed true feeling for the beauties of nature.
V Juan Leon Mera (1832-99), was the literary man of
most universal talent yet produced by Ecuador, poet,
scholar, antiquarian, novelist, excellent in all. His first
volume of verse, published in 1858, showed both acquaint-
ance with and love for the Indian traditions and lore of
his country. The short romances and poems of this vol-
ume, of which should be mentioned an ode to the sun from
the top of Panecillo, a small mountain on which the
aborigenes had a temple, were followed in 1861 by the
long legend La Virgen del Sol.

This pleasant poetic tale in verse is one of the most in-
teresting of the many which Spanish Americans have
written concerning the life of the Indians. The reader's
sympathy is awakened and held by the dramatic course
of the adventures of the lovers, while the introduction of
verses in imitation of the native serenades or "yaravies"
adds a strange exotic element. The story is laid in the
time of the conquest of Ecuador. It introduces the legend
of Uiracocha, an Inca, who had prophesied that the
country would fall into the hands of conquerors when the
volcano Cotopaxi should be in eruption. The maiden
Cisa, one of the virgins dedicated to worship of the sun,
elopes with Amaru. They live in a cabin in the woods
but their idyll is rudely disturbed by an eruption of the
volcano, which they believe is a sign of the wrath of the
deity at their sin. They flee but are captured by a band
of Indians who were searching for them. They are bound

ECUADOR

271

to stakes and about to be executed when a Spanish army
surprise the Indians. When the Spaniards learn why the
young man and maid are bound, the friar Marcos Niza
baptizes and marries them.

Mera next occupied himself with various literary and
scientific investigations on topics mainly connected with
Ecuador. He wrote a history of its literature, Ojeada
historico-critica sobre la Poesia ecuatoriandy prepared an
edition of the poems of the celebrated Mexican nun Sor
Juana Ines de la Cruz, and some years later elucidated
some obscure points in the life of Olmedo, whose letters
he edited. In 1879 he published a prose novel, Cumandd
0 un drama entre salvajes.

Cumanda is a beautiful young woman living with an
Indian family. A Spaniard, Carlos de Orozco, falls in
love with her but she is married to an old Indian chief.
The latter dies on the night of the wedding. When his
tribesmen plan to sacrifice her to his departed spirit, she
escapes through the woods to the Spanish mission. How-
ever, to save Carlos, who had been taken prisoner, and to
avoid making the mission the object of a threatened
attack by the Indians, she voluntarily gives herself up to
the savages, who thereupon sacrifice her. Carlos and
Father Domingo set out to rescue Cumanda but succeed
only in finding her charred body. Father Domingo dis-
covers that the girl was his own daughter whom he sup-
posed killed in babyhood when his farm had been sacked
by savages.

The Spanish critic Valera was much pleased by this
novel, to which he gave such high praise as the following:
** Neither Cooper nor Chateaubriand have better de-

272 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

picted the life of the woods nor have felt and described
more poetically exuberant nature still free from the power
of civilized man."

Other writers of prose fiction were Francisco Campos
with his historical and fantastic legends and Carlos R.
Tobar. The latter's Timoleon Coloma in the form of an
autobiography gave interesting sketches of life in Quito.
Other sketches he printed in volumes entitled Brochadas
and Mas Brochades.

In the field of verse Emilio Gallegos Naranjo not only
complied a Parnaso ecuatoriano but published volumes of
his own compositions, 1888. Dolores Sucre wrote a pa-
triotic ode to her ancestor General Sucre, 1896. Among
the young men who have written in modernista manner
Emilio Gallegos del Campo has won the greatest praise
from critics outside of Ecuador.

An intellectual leader of the present day in Ecuador
is Alejandro Andrade Coello, a student of literature and
founder in 191 3, of La Revista nacional in Quito.

CHAPTER IX

COLOMBIA

In studying Colombian literature, certain geographical
and historical facts about the country must be borne in
mind. Colombia occupies the northwest corner of South
America adjoining the isthmus of Panama. The first
settlements were made on the isthmus and at Santa Marta
and Cartagena on the coast of the Caribbean sea. The
climate here is excessively hot and unhealthy. Three
ranges of mountains forming part of the Andes come down
to the ocean. Between the ranges flow great rivers, the
most important of which are the Magdalena and the
Cauca. Their sources lie amid lofty mountain peaks
whose elevation above sea level frequently exceeds fifteen
thousand feet.

The first expedition to the interior set out from Santa
Marta in 1536, under the command of Gonzalo Jimenez de
Quesada. Following the Magdalena he arrived at the
site of the present city of Bogota, situated in a wide plain
at an elevation of eight thousand five hundred feet. The
soil of the "sabana" of Bogota, comprising an area of
two thousand square miles, is very fertile. Though
directly under the equator the region enjoys a mild and
agreeable climate. On account of its general resemblance
to the situation of the vega of Granada, Quesada gave
the country the name of New Granada. Being rich in

273

274 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

minerals, it attracted a fairly numerous immigration from
Spain.

To reach Bogota required in the old days a journey of
at least three weeks, and even to-day when a portion of
the distance may be traversed in a steamboat on the
Magdalena and by rail around some of its rapids, not
less than seven days are necessary for the trip. As a
consequence of their geographical isolation, the people
have retained many characteristics of their ancestors, with
less change than is the case in other Spanish-American
communities. The educated class having then distinction
of ancestry as well as inherited wealth, it is natural that
their literature should have aristocratic traits. Several
of the poets who deserve individual mention, even in so
brief an account as the present, have held the office of
president of the republic.

As the term of this office during a large part of the
nineteenth century was only two years, and there have
been no less than thirty-seven revolutions in Colombia,
many men have had an opportunity for a brief period of
enjoying the honor. The great revolution against Spanish
dominion was successful when Bolivar, in 1819, defeated
the royal soldiers at Boyaca. But the republic which
the Liberator formed from the countries now known as
Venezuela, Colombia, and Ecuador and named Colombia
lasted only till his death. The three parted company in
183 1, and New Granada reassumed her colonial name.
The political changes of 1861 guaranteed great freedom
of individual action to the various sections of the country,
which was symbolized by the name United States of
Colombia. Such turmoil resulted from the federal form

COLOMBIA 275

of government that in 1886 a new constitution setting
up the unitarian type of republic was adopted; and the
former states became departments as in the French Re-
public. The latest important episode in Colombian his-
tory was the separation of Panama, in 1903, and its es-
tablishment as an independent republic.

Among the young men of prominence in the Republic
of New Granada, was Jose Eusebio Caro (1817-53), ^^o
with his friend and fellow poet, Jose Joaquin Ortiz (1814-
92), founded the first purely literary journal. La Estrella
Nacional, in 1836. Caro was also editor of the political
journal El Granadino. His share in political life was con-
siderable as he was not only a member of Congress, but
also held various cabinet offices. An incident that oc-
curred in 1844, when he occupied a position in the office
of the Secretary of the Interior, illustrates the character
of the man. Julio Arboleda accused Caro in open con-
gress of designs on the constitution. Caro replied that
Arboleda being a slave holder, it was not fitting of him
that he should think anybody an enemy of liberty. Ar-
boleda retorted that Caro was a parasite of the govern-
ment, whereat the latter instantly resigned his position,
though he needed it to support his family.

Character in fact is the distinguishing note of Caro's
poems. He is the Puritan of South American literature.
The severity and sternness of his temperament seems to
have been inherited from his grandfather or imbibed from
his teachings. His own father, an officer in the Spanish
army, threw in his lot with the colonials on account of
his marriage to Jose's mother, but the grandfather, a
judge in the Spanish court, refused to take part in the re-

276 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

bellion. Being unable to leave Colombia on account of
a chronic ailment, he suffered much persecution. With
him the boy Jose lived during the absence of his father in
Europe on a mission for the young republic. From his
grandfather, a learned man, the boy received also much
of his early education and the first inspiration to verse
writing.

His poems are an echo of his life experiences, a sort of
diary of his moral emotions. He records his feelings at
his father's death in El Huerfano sohre el Cadaver. While
the poems to "Delina" are not so very different from the
kind of poetry that men ordinarily write to the women
they subsequently marry, those inspired by his marriage
and the events of his married life possess a strange orig-
inality of conception. His Bendicion Nupcial treats the
subject of marriage from a point of view that ought to
delight the present day advocates of eugenics. But even
they might balk at the poet's procedure in A su Primo-
genito, written before the child's birth. Accused by his
contemporaries of obscenity in this poem, he replied that
he would give his son the pen with which he blessed him
before birth. Upon the occasion of the baptism of his
second son, Caro wrote El Bautismo, a defense of Chris-
tianity. No less vehement was he in political verse, es-
pecially on topics dealing with liberty.

In this regard he was ready to stand by his opinions, a
fact which led to the one great event of his life and per-
haps ultimately to his death. He dared to defend in
print and before the government, a man whom he be-
lieved was being unjustly treated. The result, however,
was a sentence of imprisonment against Caro. But his

COLOMBIA 277

friends succeeded in getting him out of the country, and
he lived in banishment for three years in New York.
When politics at home allowed his return, he set out in fine
spirits and health, but on arriving at Santa Marta he was
seized by a fever and died the sudden death of the tropics.
The lyrical quality of Carols poetry is considerable.
At the same time his poems are filled with ideas, so that
they resemble to some extent brilliant declamatory ora-
tions. He was accustomed to use unusual meters and
rhyme schemes. A fair notion of his workmanship and
his worth as a poet may be obtained by the follow^ing
translation of the lines, En Boca del fjltimo Inca, rendered
in approximately the meter of the original with the same
scheme of rhymes.

To-day arriving on Pichincha's slope,
The deadly cannon of the whites I flee,
Like the sun a wanderer, like the sun aflame,
Like the sun free.

O Sun, my Father, hearken! Manco's throne
Lies in the dust; Thy altar's sanctity
Profaned; exalting thee alone I pray.
Alone but free.

O Sun, my Father, hearken! A slave before
The nations of the world I'll not agree
To bear the mark. To slay myself I come.
To die though free.

To-day Thou wilt perceive me, when afar
Thou dost begin to sink into the sea,
Singing Thy hymns on the volcano's top,
Singing and free.

278 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

To-morrow though, alas! when once again
Thy crown throughout the east will shining be,
Its golden splendor on my tomb will fall,
My tomb though free.

Upon my tomb the condor will descend
From heaven, the condor, bird of liberty.
And building there its nest, will hatch its young.
Unknown and free.^

To his friend and co-editor, J. J. Ortiz, the poet
Caro owes the publication of his collected poems. Ortiz
is himself reckoned among Colombia's great poets, but
his inspiration had its sources more directly in the ro-
mantic school, and he lived a much longer life. On the
other hand, Caro's congressional opponent, Julio Arboleda,
was exactly his contemporary, as they were both born
in the spring of the same year. Arboleda must be ac-
counted, however, the greater poet.

Julio Arboleda (1817-1862) was descended from one of
the earliest settlers in the bishopric of Popayan, a district
on the headwaters of the Cauca near the border of Ecuador
on the old trade route between Bogota and Quito. His
father, Rafael Arboleda, was a trusted friend of Bolivar
and ruined his health on a mission for the Liberator. In
1830, taking with him his son Julio, he went to Europe in
search of relief. The father died within a year, but the
son remained for eight years till he received the degree of
Bachelor of Arts from the University of London. On his
return to Popayan he plunged with all the ardor of youth
into politics. Though he was one of the richest proprietors
of the locality, he enlisted in the national guard then form-

* Version of Alfred Coester.

COLOMBIA 279

ing to put down a serious revolution against the govern-
ment at Bogota.

His personality was attractive. Throughout the coun-
try he became known as "Don Julio." His bravery won
for him steady advancement in military rank so that at
the end of the war, 1842, he went home as a colonel. Then
he married and devoted his time to his estate and to letters.
His neighbors interrupted this manner of life by sending
him to the Congress, where he was conspicuous for his
oratory.

As a member of the opposition he published an im-
portant pamphlet against the Jesuits, but when in 1849 his
party won the upper hand and electing Jose H. L5pez
president, proceeded to expel the order, Arboleda was un-
willing to follow all his measures. He withdrew to his
native town and began the publication of a satirical jour-
nal, El Misoforoy against the democratic and socialistic
liberal party. For this he was thrown into prison. From
its walls he sent forth his two most noted political poems,
Estoy en la cdrcel, and Al Congreso granadino. In the
former he lashed with bitter invective "Lopez el Tirano"
and his judge, Miguel Valencia, who was recklessly con-
demning to death even women. In the latter poem he
urged the Congress to stand firm in "the defense of the
people" and "restore to the Republic her ancient majesty."

Having been set free from prison by reason of money
paid by his brother, Arboleda joined the revolution that
was beginning in the province on the frontier of Ecuador.
Badly beaten he and his companions made their way
through Ecuador to Lima. At this time his property was
sacked and the papers in his house destroyed. Among them

28o LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

was the manuscript of the long poem which is Arboleda's
chief claim to fame as a poet, the epic history of Gonzalo
de Oyon. After residing in Peru till the beginning of 1853,
he set out for New York, bidding farewell to "gaya Lima"
in a lyric outburst that contrasted his melancholy state as
a proscribed person with the dwellers in an earthly Eden.
This gem begins: —

Me voy de las playas alegres, siiaves,
Do el Rimac corriendo tranquilo murmulla;
Do el cefiro alienta, la t6rtola arrulla.
Do nunca ha apagado sus rayos el sol.

The next year with a change in the government Arboleda
returned to Bogota as a senator. It was not long before
civil war again prevailed. Arboleda held this time a high
position in the army of the constitutionalists operating
against the dictator Melo. Success crowned their arms.
As President of Congress Arboleda inducted into office the
new President Mallarino. In 1856 Ospina of the con-
servative party was elected President, but the caudillo
Mosquera instantly started a revolt. At this period
Arboleda was in Europe for the purpose of educating his
children. When affairs were going badly with Ospina he
called upon Arboleda to assist. The latter felt that duty
claimed him and leaving Paris he reached Colombia in the
autumn of i860. He took command at Santa Marta
where he was promptly besieged. After a month he was
obliged to evacuate. He transferred his troops and
munitions of war by sea to Panama, thence he organized
an expedition along the Cauca river to march upon
Popayan. In this region the popularity of "Don Julio"

COLOMBIA 281

brought hundreds of the country people to his standard.
As the government of Ospina had legally come to an end,
his enthusiastic followers elected Arboleda President, but
the ratification by the Congress required by the constitu-
tion was impossible, because Mosquera had taken Bogota
by assault and the members had fled. As general in chief
of the constitutional forces Arboleda held his own against
the dictator for upwards of a year. In one of his battles
he defeated and took prisoner the President of Ecuador,
Garcia Moreno, who had taken a part in the struggle near
the border. But his lieutenants were less successful and
his soldiers opposed to expeditions that would take them
far from home. The end came on November 12, 1862,
when he was killed by an assassin who lay in wait for him
by the wayside.

Something is added to the comprehension of Arboleda*s
character by the perusal of extracts from a letter to an
English friend about the time of his resistance to the
government of Lopez. " Fortune has of late smiled upon
me most graciously. My business has not only gone on
very well in general, but my lands have such a great
quantity of excellent quinine that for many years I shall
be able to export two thousand sacks annually. I have
a contract for three thousand which I am sure to deliver
within these twelve months. The export will cost me very
little because I have more than five hundred idle mules,
which by the exercise of taking my bales to port will gain
in vigor and value. . . . The quinine on my lands seems
inexhaustible. In twenty years I shall have cut the last
trees and then the first will have grown again."

It is apparent that such a man was moved to take part

J

282 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

in politics not through hope of personal gain but from the
highest motives. The analogy between himself and the
hero of his great poem, Gonzalo de Oyon, gives it an added
interest.

Though the author spent the leisure moments of ten
years upon the poem, it was left unfinished. The man-
uscript of a large part was destroyed by the soldiers who
sacked his house. Rewritten, another large section was lost
during the transport of some of Arboleda's effects. As a
result of its fragmentary state and the conditions under
which it was produced the whole lacks unity of conception
both of character and action.

The foundation is a legend which Arboleda found in the
local history of his native Popayan. Fleeing from the fate
of those involved in the rebellion of Gonzalo Pizarro there
came to New Granada one Alvaro de Oyon. Having
gathered a band of malcontents to the number of seventy-
five, they planned to seize the city of Popayan, thence to
march on Quito and Lima. The assault took place in
1552 but with disastrous results to the conspirators.
Alvaro was killed.

The poet gave to Alvaro a brother, Gonzalo, who is a foil
to his schemes as well as a contrast to his character. The
latter is represented as coming to Popayan with the con-
quistadores. His kind heart leads him to intercede for the
cacique Puben about to be killed by the Spaniards so that
he saves the Indian's life. Now Fernando, the son of the
Adelantado, Sebastian de Benalcazar, has cast eyes upon
the cacique's daughter, Pubenza, and forces her to marry
him in order to save her father's life during Gonzalo's
absence. A few years later Alvaro de Oyon in rebellion

COLOMBIA 283

against the authorities after getting auxiliaries among the
savage tribes, marches on Popayan. Gonzalo, supposedly
dead, appears at the fight and decides it in favor of the
royal cause. Fernando in jealousy declares Gonzalo an
outlaw and sets a price on his head, but Pubenza warns him
in time for him to take refuge among the Indians. Once
more Alvaro de Oyon attacks the city and again Gonzalo
sallies forth in its defense. In the night the brothers en-
gage in single combat, but recognizing each other they fall
into discussion about their respective behaviour. A truce
follows. During this the unhappy lovers Gonzalo and
Pubenza have an interview at which they are surprised by
Fernando, who in mad jealous rage kills his children. In
the form of a specter he presents himself again to Gonzalo
and Pubenza but disappears then forever.

The fragments break off here. Report has it that
Arboleda intended to have Alvaro desist from his rebel-
lious plans at the solicitation of his mother. Of this there
are some evidences in the poem.

The style and language of the poem is purely Castilian
with only a slight admixture of native words in certain
familiar scenes. The narration shows the author's ac-
quaintance with both the Italian poets and Byron and
like the Spanish romanticists he preferred to write in a
variety of meters.

In regard to the application of the poem to affairs in
Colombia, the words of Miguel A. Caro ^ are illuminating.
"Putting aside the improbability of the conversation
between Gonzalo and Alvaro, it is of the highest interest
because it has natural application to the perpetual struggle
» Introduction to Poesias de Julio ArboUda, New York, 1884.

284 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

which in our Spanish America is sustained by the broad
genuine patriotism which respects tradition and loves
national unity against those bastard ambitions which
proclaim liberty but demolish whatever exists. The
language which Arboleda put in the mouth of Alvaro
is historically exact. It is the same as that of all those
rebels and political dogmatists of colonial times. In their
turn are symbolized in Gonzalo all the champions and
martyrs of political and religious faith in our country
and among them most of all Julio Arboleda."

Whatever may have been the sources of Arboleda's
inspiration, the romantic spirit that moved other Colom-
bian poets entered the country by way of Caracas, ac-
cording to Rafael Pombo.^ From there came not only
the works of Zorrilla and Espronceda but also the literary
journals containing the poems of Abigail Lozano and J. A.
Maitin. Their most important effect was the awakening
of an interest in the beauties of nature, that wonderful
scenery of Colombia, its great rivers, its magnificent
cascades, its stupendous mountains, and its strange and
varied flora. The falls of Tequendama especially became
the topic of literary exercise.

This fall though with less volume of water drops four
times the distance of Niagara, about four hundred and
eighty feet. In descending the water strikes a ledge of
rock and rebounds, then drops in several streams. Much
of it is turned to vapor which ascends and when gilded
by the sunlight the iridescence may be seen in Bogota
five leagues away.

Among the earliest poems of Gregorio Gutierrez Gon-
^ Introduction to Poesias de Gutierrez Gonzalez,

COLOMBIA 285

zaiez (1826-72) is one writtea at the age of twenty with
the title Al Salto del Tequendama. That it was not con-
ceived wholly in the romantic mood is shown by a quota-
tion from Andres Bello which serves as a sort of sub-title,
referring to the river Magdalena and this fall. The great
master's influence becomes again apparent in Gutierrez
Gonzalez' longest and most famous poem Sohre el Cultivo
del Maiz en Antioquia, 1866. Written in quatrains it
depicted in a lively and poetic style scenes of agricultural
labor in the author's native province; and was accom-
panied by a glossary of terms peculiar to that country.
The poem opens with a description of the clearing of a
piece of land by a gang of thirty laborers. The poet,
more attentive to the landscape than they, sees many
things which he describes to the reader; and in the four
sections of the poem takes him through the various tasks
required before the final storing of the grain.

The poet belonged, however, wholly to the romantic
type. Sent away from home to school in Bogota he began
writing verses at the age of eighteen. He was gifted with
extraordinary ability in improvising, with which he used
to amuse his schoolmates. To this fact is due perhaps the
peculiar quality of his lines that made him the popular
poet of Colombia, and his pen name "Antioco" a house-
hold word. Even illiterate persons knew his poems by
heart.

In his life too he was a true romantic. When not quite
twenty he fell so violently in love at first sight with a
young lady that when she passed near him he became
so faint that he had to be supported by his companions.
He consulted a physician on the disorders of his heart

286 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

and this worthy told him to go home and prepare to die.
He went home but not before he chided in verse the beauty
whose "barbarous scorn had opened for him the last
dwelling," and though for her he descended to the sepul-
cher, he would never receive "even one tear from her di-
vine eyes."

The mournful tone did not long predominate. Soon
thereafter he married the Julia who then appeared in his
lines as the source of the joy which filled his life. After
ten years of matrimony in reply to the question of a
friend why he no longer sang, he wrote those verses on his
happiness comparing himself to the dove that in the noon-
day heat attends silent but happy on his beloved in the
nest; happiness, moreover, resembles the morning-glory
that blooms in the shade but withers in the sunlight.

In his material fortunes he was not so happy. Though
he was bom wealthy, he became involved in the civil wars
of i860 and 62, and his property was swept away. After
the restoration of peace he was not successful in his busi-
ness enterprises. Besides he had eight children to support.
His discouragement was expressed all too plaintively in
the verses addressed to various friends and to his wife
during his last years. The evident sincerity of these poems
confirms one in the opinion that Gutierrez Gonzalez*
wide popularity is due to the predominance of that quality
in his work. Therein lies its firm appeal.

Less popular were the poems of J. J. Ortiz, and much
less numerous though he lived to be nearly seventy-eight
years old. To his romanticism he joined a certain classical
finish for which reason Menendez y Pelayo reckoned one
of his poems, Los Colonos "one of the finest jewels of

COLOMBIA 287

American poetry; — descriptive and lyrical at the same
time." In this gem the poet represents himself on his
horse galloping to the distant city. His imagination
carries him back to the time of the conquistadores who
first planted the cross on that spot to the amazement
of the aborigines. Then he invites the Muse to listen
to the resounding blows of the pioneers' axes as they clear
the forest and build their homes; to watch the bull breaking
the black soil to receive the grain brought from beyond
the seas; to observe the other domestic animals; to con-
sider the Spanish woman who brought with her as a re-
minder of her homeland the seeds of the flowers whose
beauty and fragrance now delight the senses; to admire,
when the bell calls to prayer, the holy ardor of Christ's
disciples who have penetrated the most distant parts of
the new world.

But, though the great Spanish critic may have admired
Ortiz' descriptive verses, his countrymen preferred those
with the Tyrtaean note. It is related that one evening he
nearly started a riot by the recitation of his stirring lines.
The special object of his admiration was Bolivar. In his
boyhood he had seen the great man and had been a childish
witness of the armies that fought the battle of Boyaca
in his native province. To that battle he dedicated an
ode which for patriotic inspiration will bear comparison
with Olmedo's verses. When at seventy years of age
Ortiz was one of the few living contemporaries of that
victory, he wrote his greatest ode Colombia y Espana in
which he compares Columbus and Bolivar. If the one
discovered a world the other freed it from the yoke of
tyranny. The memory of the champion of liberty gives

288 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

consolation to the poet in the midst of the civil discords
in which he lives.

Ortiz' influence as a man, apart from his poems, was
considerable. He opened a school in 1852 that became a
center for the cherishing of literature and culture. Four
years later he successfully promoted the establishment
of a literary society. El Liceo Granadino. He also took
part in the protest against the expulsion of the Jesuits,
that event which stirred Colombian society to its very
depths in 1863. A pamphlet of his on this topic was sold
in the unprecedented quantity of four thousand copies in
Bogota. Throughout his long life as a journalist and
educator, his own writings and the editing of those of
others, such as the poems of J. E. Caro and the revolu-
tionary Vargas Tejada and the compilation of school
textbooks in literature kept his name ever before the
public.

The year 1854 may be taken to fix the period of greatest
literary activity in Colombia. Poetry did not alone claim
attention in this decade, but there were representations
of original dramas and an important development in the
publication of Hterary journals. The latter opened a
field for the production of novels and tales.

Of dramas the authors most worthy of mention were
the brothers Felipe and Santiago Perez, Jose Caicedo
Rojas, and Jose M. Samper. Their writings, however,
were not limited to the theater but appeared in both prose
and verse in periodicals or daily papers. Felipe Perez
being interested in the early history of South America
dramatized the story of Gonzalo Pizarro in five acts, and
retold as tales the story of both Pizarros and that of

COLOMBIA 289

Atahualpa. Santiago Perez, who later became president
of the republic in 1874, turned to European history for
the matter of his historical dramas Jacobo Molay and El
Castillo de Berkley and his legend Leonor. Spanish history
on the other hand was the inspiration of Miguel Cervantes
and Celos, amor y amhicion by J. Caicedo Rojas and of
his historical romance Don Alvaro. Caicedo Rojas also
published a volume of descriptive articles of manners,
Apuntes de Rancheria, which met with some success.

Jose Maria Samper (1828-98) devoted his attention
more to his native country. He is perhaps Colombia's
most prolific writer in many lines of literary endeavor.
Seven of his dramatical pieces were produced in Bogota
in the years 1856 and 57. Of these the most successful
was Un Alcalde a la antigua y Dos Primos a la moderna,
a comedy of national manners. In 1858 Samper went
to Europe in a diplomatic capacity where he remained
five years, returning to Colombia after a visit in Lima.
Many years later he put into a novel, Los Claveles de
Julia, his memories of that capital. After his return to
Bogota he wrote a novel about every four years, beginning
with Martin Florez, 1866. The dramatic element and
the dialogue is the strongest part of his tales as the de-
scription of places and persons is prolix. To the study
of Colombian history Samper performed a real service
by publishing a series of sketches of notable compatriots.
Toward the end of his life he made quite a sensation by
publicly renouncing his views as a freethinker and em-
bracing Catholicism. The book which he made out of
his profession, Historia de una Alma, is packed with in-
teresting personal and social reminiscences. Samper's

290 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

journalistic work was perhaps the most extensive of his
contemporaries. At one time he carried on a periodical
with the sole assistance of his talented wife, Dona Soledad
Acosta.

To her we owe an interesting account of the methods
employed by the contributors to the Mosaico, the most
important literary journal of the golden decade of the
fifties. Beside her husband and Caicedo Rojas, they were
Jose Joaquin Borda (1835-78), to whose constant activity
in promoting literary magazines Colombia remains in debt;
Ricardo Carrasquilla (1827-87), schoolmaster and poet;
Eugenio Diaz (1804-61), writer of realistic tales; and J. M.
Vergara y Vergara (1831-72), lover of letters. She makes
the very illuminating remark, "We edited the Mosaico
to amuse ourselves without considering the public." But
the magazine to which she contributed this article. El
Papel Periodico Ilustrado, beginning publication in 1881,
did take the public very much into consideration because
it was the first illustrated periodical on an elaborate
scale, printed in Colombia.

In regard to Jose Maria Vergara y Vergara it has been
said that, "whoever makes a formal study of Colombian
letters will find his name somehow connected with most
of the publications of his epoch and will see his enthusiasm
for stimulating and sustaining the literary aspirations of
friends and strangers." ^ Of his own writings the most
important is his Historia de la Literatura en Nueva Granada
desde la conquista hasta la independenciay 1^^8-1820, pub-
lished in 1867. As a compiler of poems he rendered a
service in La Lira granadina, coleccioii de poesias nacion-
^ I. Laverde Amaya, Apuntes sobre Bibliografia colombiana.

COLOMBIA 291

ales. His own verses, though he wrote with great ease
and was famous as an improviser, were slight. Little
more can be said of the tale, Olivos y Aceitunas, Todos
son unos.

But he discovered the talent of Eugenio Diaz, the most
realistic of Colombian novelists and writers of articles on
manners. Bom in 1804, he was over forty years of age
before he began to write. Having been a small farmer
he brought to his work an intimate knowledge of the
types that he depicted. His longest tale, a real master-
piece of characterization, was Manuela. The heroine
is the keeper of a small provision store through which
pass all the interesting individuals of the town and where
their affairs are thoroughly discussed.

Vergara, on his trip to Europe, made numerous friends
and brought back to Bogota authorization for himself,
Jose Maria Marroquin, and Miguel Antonio Caro to form
an Academy allied to the Spanish Academy. Marroquin
was a popular schoolmaster, author of works on Castilian
spelling, and a poet whose verses were favorites on account
of their humor. M. A. Caro (i 843-1909), though but
twenty-seven years of age at the time, was noted for his
learning. He was the oldest son of J. E. Caro to whose
famous poem blessing his firstborn before birth we
have already alluded. The father, had he lived, would
not have been disappointed in the son for he became
Colombia's most learned man and president of the re-
public. His greatest service to Colombian letters was
the preparation of an edition of Arboleda's poems which
included the inedited epic Gonzalo de Oyon. Miguel
A. Caro's own poems were somewhat coldly classical in

292 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

form and idea. Nevertheless two of them are well known
and liked, La Vuelta a la Patria and A la Estatua del
Libertador. The latter is a presentation of the moral
character of Bolivar, accomplished in part by incorporat-
ing in the poem certain historical sayings of the Liberator,
such as: — "Who knows whether I have ploughed on the
sea and built on the wind,'* and, "Perhaps the curses of
a hundred generations will fall on me, unfortunate author
of so many ills!" These sublime doubts, says the poet,
have been expressed by the sculptor who wrought the
great statue of the Liberator in the main square of Bogota.

The Vuelta a la Patria expresses in sweetly melancholy
fashion the idea that the sight of his old home does not
satisfy the longings of the pilgrim because his true home
lies beyond the term of this life. The Spanish critic
Valera thinks that, "Everything in this composition, in
which there are more sentiments and ideas than words,
make it a perfect model of sentimental poetry in any
language." ^

Reference has been made to Ricardo Carrasquilla. He
was a well-beloved schoolmaster who delighted his pupils
by jocose verses on homely topics. His lines on Las
Fiestas en Bogota are called "a real photograph of what
our popular festivals are." But more important for his
contemporaries were such tracts on the religious question
as Sofismas anti-catolicos vistos con microscopio.

The mention of writings of this character would seem

to lie outside our limits, but in studying the history of

Colombia whether literary or political, it is impossible

to ignore the religious question. The liberal party that

* J. Valera, Cartas americanas.

COLOMBIA 293 '

came into power in 1849 were dominated by the theories
of French freethinkers. Though their action in expelling
the Jesuits was resented and they fell from power, they
were successful in 1861 in setting up a new constitution
which enabled them to disestablish the Church, disfran-
chise the clergy, and confiscate the property of the con-
vents. It is natural then that such profound changes
emanating from radical principles should have echoes
in literature which is not in itself controversial. Hence
arises the significance of the great amount of religious
verse.

As a controversialist for the conservatives nobody was
more active than the Manuel Maria Madiedo (1817-
00), whose writings include whole volumes on social
science, logic and law. A very learned man and acquainted
with the whole range of European philosophy, he devoted
his intelligence to the defense of the Christian religion.
Many of the poems in his volume of collected verse pub-
lished in 1859 preach the mission of Christ. As a poet,
however, Madiedo is more generally known for his lines
descriptive of the great river Magdalena, "a picture
taken from nature, where primitive man rules, free and
strong, but struggling with natural forces terribly power-
ful, beautiful, and rebellious." With equal enthusiasm
Madiedo also depicted his native city Cartagena and the
ocean before her walls. A series of poems with strongly
patriotic note on Bolivar, Sucre, Ayacucho, and America
likewise came from his pen. Dramas he wrote in his youth,
and at the age of nineteen had a tragedy, entitled Lucrecia
0 Roma lihre, produced in Bogota. To the end of his
long life he contributed to the press of Colombia.

294 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Contrasted with Madiedo may be Rafael Nunez (1825-
94), a man of action and yet a poet. For twenty years
he dominated the political situation in Colombia, being
at times both president and dictator. As a young man
he was the secretary of General Mosquera, the leader of
the liberal party and dictator in 1861. From this period
dates Nunez' poem with the title dQue sais-je?, one of the
most skeptical bits of verse ever written. Everywhere
the poet finds the good and the bad so inextricably mingled
that he cannot separate them. Every object in the world
has its good and its evil side. Sometimes innocence and
candor are malignity, prudence is daring, impiety piety.
In another skeptical poem Nuiiez compares himself with
the Dead Sea; his illusions and pleasures are the cities
which God destroyed.

From this attitude of mind Nunez traveled very far
before his death. Sent to England as Colombian consul
in Liverpool, he absorbed many English ideas regarding
the functions of government. In 1878 he became President
of the Senate and two years later President of Colombia.
He adapted his English ideas to the conditions of his
country. His ideal seemed to be an oligarchy as set forth
in his book La Reforma politica en Colombia. His model
was Moses if we can trust his poem on the Hebrew law-
giver. At any rate, he brought about many needed re-
forms in Colombia laid waste by anarchy. To combat
it, he protected the clergy, restored them to the rights
of which his own liberal party had deprived them and
ordered religion to be taught in the schools for the pur-
pose of inculcating respect for authority. The civil power
was strengthened by his new constitution of 1885, for the

COLOMBIA 295

term of office for the president was increased to six years.
With vice presidents of his own creation, he then held
the position till his death.

While Nunez' philosophical verses reveal him as a
skeptic, the poems of Diego Fallon (1834-190!;), present
the ancient faith in accord with modem geological knowl-
edge. There is something of the Celtic imagination, due
undoubtedly to his parentage, in the originality of his con-
ceptions. Perhaps also his English education had its
influence just as his expert attainments as a musician are
revealed in the rhythmical beauty of his lines. At once
the most striking and original of his poems is Las Rocas de
Suesca. The poet finds himself among these gigantic
rocks overhearing the confidences of Miocene and Pliocene
till their chatter is interrupted by Siluria the elder. She
at his request relates her own creation. Another poem,
J la Luna, depicts the beauty of the tropical moonlight on
the slope of the Andes. The silence leads him to think
of God, to feel that his soul is merely a prisoner of the
flesh, while the moon reminds him of its divine mission.
Fallon's skill in difficult and intricate meter is displayed
in La Palma del Desierto, in which he philosophizes about
the barren desert and the strange power of the palm tree
to withstand the heat of the sun and the tree's service
to man. While the quantity of Fallon's verses is not
great, their quality places him in the front rank of Colom-
bian poets.

And the main body of Colombian poets with an individ-
ual note is fairly numerous. Joaquin Pablo Posada
(1825-80), for example, had an astounding facility in
handling language, though his compositions were limited

296 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

to jocose or satirical matter. Even on his deathbed he
dictated as gay a parting letter in verse to a friend as any
that he had ever written when begging for a little loan of
money to tide him over a hard place. A poet who knew
how to hit the popular taste was Jose Maria Pinzon Rico.
His erotic tendencies appear in the poem usually given in
anthologies El Despertar de Addn though the intention
of the verses is praise of God. A very prolific versifier
was Cesar Conto (1836-91). His original pieces are not
so valuable as his translations from German and English.
Of the latter the most praiseworthy is perhaps Long-
fellow's Psalm of Life. For religious intensity and force
the lines of Mario Valenzuela, a member of the Society of
Jesus, should be mentioned. An attractive poem, Tu
triunfastey describes the appearance of a beautiful woman
riding on horseback, and again at a dancing party; on
neither occasion, however, did she make an impression on
the writer's heart: but when he saw her as a sister of
charity ministering to the sick, he quite succumbed.

A leader of this flight of poets, surpassing them, both
in versatility and in technical skill, was Rafael Pombo
(i 833-191 2). He began his literary career at the age of
twenty by a mystification of the public in giving out a
series of verses entitled Mi Amor signed " Edda," which
led readers to believe that they were perusing the erotic
confessions of a lovesick damsel. In 1854 he was sent to
New York as secretary of the Colombian legation where he
remained five years. He so successfully mastered the
English language that poems of his in English were pub-
lished by Bryant in the New York Evening Post. Of his
sojourn his poems have many recollections. Las Norte-

COLOMBIA 297

americanas en Broadway reveals the young man beneath
the portico of the Saint Nicolas Hotel admiring the
throng of passing beauties. Though he pays his com-
pliments to the various Spanish-American types, he is be-
witched by the brilliance of the New Yorkers' eyes and the
crimson of their cheeks. But "woe to him who sees the
fascinating army!" Their hearts, like the swirling water
of Niagara, are cruel, insatiable and cold. On his sen-
sitive soul the sudden death of a young girl, Elvira Tracy,
with whom he had been at church, made such an impression
that his poem on her last words, "The mass is over; come,
come, let us go home!" possesses unusual intensity of
feeling. For that reason it is a classic expression of the
uncertainty of human life.

Of totally different character are Cuentos pintados and
Cuentos morales, many of which are said to be known by
heart by children. After his return to Colombia, Pombo
was interested for several years in popular education and
in the publication of an educational journal. Of a popular
type also are a series of quatrains written to be sung to
the music of the national air. El Bambuco.

About this song, J. M. Samper has written the follow-
ing: "Nothing more national and patriotic than this
melody which has for authors all Colombians: it vibrates
as the echo of millions of accents, it laments with all
lamentations, it laughs with all the laughter of the coun-
try. It is the evocation of our moonlit nights and our
days of happiness. It is the companion that animates
our weddings, that enlivens our sentimental ceremonies.
It is the soul of our people turned into melody."

Pombo's maturer lines belong to the elegiac type, and

298 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

are written with great depth of feeHng. A rather long
poem, Angelina, after relating the death of a young girl
of fifteen with emphasis on the grief of her mother and
little brother, passes to reflections on love and grief. In
them the poet finds symbolized the struggle between our
higher and lower natures. In "love and grief, there is
Christ, there is God." When Pombo revisited the United
States and again stood before the falls of Niagara, he was
stirred to write some verses in "contemplation." The
greatness of God is the main thought with which the
sight inspires him. When he seeks for the terror felt by
the Cuban poet Heredia, he finds it not; for the very worst
that Nature can do to human kind, to serve for a tomb,
is in reality a good. On the contrary, man is the monster
who disturbs this earthly paradise. As for the falling
waters, though they send forth a hymn of strength and
life, his soul has no enthusiasm left to sing them because
life is a sarcasm.

Poets of a younger generation than Pombo, such as
Antonio Gomez Restrepo (b. 1869), Diego Uribe (b.
1867), Joaquin Gonzalez Camargo (b. 1865), naturally
show the influence of contemporary literature. To the
latter J. Valera paid the unusual compliment of saying
that his becquerista verses pleased him even better than
those of Becquer or Heine.

No account of Colombian literature would be com-
plete without mention of a few of the many female poets
and writers who have graced their country. Their promi-
nence is partly due to the fact that in the population of
Colombia women greatly outnumber men, in some towns,
according to a recent census, in the proportion of three

COLOMBIA 299

men to four women, as a result of the numerous civil wars
which have ravaged the republic. The Christian resigna-
tion required of women in such a state of affairs is clearly
reflected in their verses.

For the religious tone of her poems expressed in fluent
language Dona Silveria Espinosa de Rendon (?-i886),
was one of the first to attract attention. Though she
essayed with some success the patriotic lyric, the majority
of her verses celebrate the glories of the Cross, the virtues
of Mary and the joys of friendship.

In descriptive poetry too, so far as it deals with the
famous falls of the Tequendama, a woman, in Valera's
opinion, has excelled her numerous competitors both
native and foreign. Therefore, Doiia Agripina Montes
del Valle should be acclaimed the "Muse of the Tequen-
dama." The superiority of her lines arises not alone from
the wealth of color and the minuteness of the description
but from the fact that at the background of the picture
the reader sees the poetess herself. "The depression which
possesses her spirit in the presence of such a grand scene
makes one form a better conception of its magnificence."
Dofia Agripina gathered poetic laurels also outside of
Colombia, for she won a gold medal for a poem offered in
a Chilean competition in 1872.

The theme of love treated with deep emotion and sin-
cerity fills the verses of Dona Mercedes Alvarez de Florez
(b. 1859). They render the story of her courtship and
marriage to Leonidas Florez (1859-87), himself a poet.
As they were poor, their parents opposed their union.
After their marriage, she has given a poetic record of her
moods. Matrimony has chains, yes; but they are golden,

300 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

let her kiss them. At times she is jealous of her husband
for she knows he lies awake at night, with thoughts which
are not of her but of his ambition. Seek not riches, she
urges him, let her whisperings suffice at night. When he
fell sick at the age of twenty-four, her heart cries out that
they are too young to separate. He should struggle
against death by drawing strength from her kisses. To
God she prays not to "snatch from my heaven this bright
star which thine does not need! Listen. In his delirium,
he says that he loves me so much, that he does not wish
to die!"

Of Doiia Soledad Acosta de Samper (1831-1913), wife
of J. M. Samper, mention has already been made. Her
literary interests covered many fields though her specialty
was the historical or biographical article, for which she
inherited a natural aptitude from her father, the historian
Joaquin Acosta. Her most original effort was the pub-
lication of a periodical for women. La Mujer, which ap-
peared from 1878 to 1881.
r 'in the matter of novels it has fallen to the fortune of
Colombia to send forth the most widely read work of
fiction of any written by a Spanish American, one of the
very few which have been translated into French and
English, the idyllic romance, Maria by Jorge Isaacs.
Perhaps its popularity proves it to be the representative
Spanish-American novel. At any rate it presents an un-
matched picture of home Hfe in Colombia. Its characters
are true to life. Its landscapes exist in the valley of the
Cauca where its author was born.

The plot is simple. Efrain, a boy of twenty, returns
home after an absence of several years. He finds that

COLOMBIA 301

Maria, his father's ward and the playmate of his child-
hood, is now in the first beauty of young womanhood at
fifteen. They fall in love. The father, not wholly op-
posed to the match, wishes the boy to delay marriage,
first, that he may study medicine in Europe, and second,
because Maria has shown symptoms of epilepsy, a dis-
ease of which her mother died. Efrain yields to his
father's desires and prepares to leave for Europe.
Before his departure, however, Maria and he are be-
trothed. After he is gone, Maria's malady becomes
worse and she imagines that only his return will save;:?
her life. Efrain is sent for, but when he reaches h^pt{e
Maria is dead. ^^

The interest lies in the incidents by which the characters
of the leading personages are revealed and in the details
of home life in the mountains of Colombia. What in-
tensity of passion is displayed over trifles! Efrain, for
example, had brought home some mountain lilies as a
present to Maria, but when he notices that she has neg-
lected to observe her custom of placing fresh flowers in
his room during his absence, he petulantly throws his
intended gift out of the window. Maria, finding the
flowers, understands and makes amends by wearing one
of the lilies to the evening meal. It is not surprising then,
that the same Efrain should urge his horse at the risk of
his own life into a stream swollen with tropical rain, as
he rides three leagues through the night to get a physician
to attend Maria.

Strange details of real life constantly entertain and
charm the reader. Though Efrain's father is the pro-
prietor of a vast estate, he is not unwilling to attend the

302 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

wedding of a negro slave and dance with the bride. When
Efrain visits the home of a certain white tenant, he is
honored by being provided with the only knife and fork
in the house, and again at his morning ablutions by the
zealous production from its precious box of the family's
one treasured towel. A striking episode is a jaguar hunt,
in which Efrain's English cartridges and unerring aim
save the life of the mountaineer Braulio. This man is
something of a wag, for when a young visitor from the
city makes fun of his dogs, Braulio takes revenge in an
original manner. He sees to it that there are no bullets
in the smarty's gun and then drives a fine buck by his
stand in the hunt. The callow youth is mortified to miss
so easy a shot before his friends. In Efrain's home, the
details of the daily routine in which appear his father, his
mother, his sister Emma, and Maria form an exquisite
idyllic picture. To relate them all would, in the words
of Vergara in his preface to the first edition of 1867,
"necessitate writing another Maria.''*
Jl^ The author of this romance, Jorge Isaacs (1837-95) was
' the son of an English Jew domiciled in Cali in the valley
of the Cauca. It was in this region that the civil war of
1862 raged with special intensity. In consequence of it
his property gone and left an orphan, the young man
emigrated to Bogota. In 1865 he published a volume of
verses which received more attention after the appearance
of Maria, 1867. The success of the novel was immediate.
His reward was an appointment to a diplomatic post in
Chile where his fame as a literary man assisted in prepar-
ing for him a warm welcome. In time political changes
at home brought about his retirement. Again in Bogota

COLOMBIA 303

he was not successful in business, and the latter years of
his life were passed in great want.

Later novels in Colombia follow the example of Isaacs
in his nationalistic tendency, though few deserve mention.
Frutosdemi TiVrr^, published 1896 byTomasCarrasquilla,
is a fair sample of the type consisting of a series of sketches
of manners strung together on a thin plot.

Of greater literary value is Pax by Lorenzo Marroquin
which recently created a storm of indignation because
certain politicians believed they had been caricatured.
At any rate the author has pilloried the plague of politics
which besets Colombia. The personages and the inci-
dents of the novel give the reader an unusual insight into
the character of a perplexing country.

>f scholars Colombia has produced several of whom
she may well be proud. The most important historian
is Jose Manuel Restrepo (1782-1863) whose Historia de
la Revolucion de la Republica de Colombia, originally pub-
lished in 1827 and enlarged in 1858, is the fascinating nar-
^rative of a participant and eyewitness.

J. M. Torres Caicedo deserves the praise and thanks
of everybody interested in Spanish-American literature.
His Ensayos biogrdficos y de Critica literaria in three vol-
umes, 1863 and 1868, was the first attempt to treat the
whole field and is still invaluable.

The name of Rufino Jose Cuervo (1844-1911) is familiar
to many otherwise ignorant of Colombian writers, on
account of his services to the grammatical and lexico-
graphic studies of the Spanish language given to the world
in his notes to Bello's Grammar and in his Apuntaciones
criticas sobre el Lenguaje bogotano. The latter is the basis

304 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

of all the many studies which have, since its publication,
been made of the changes undergone by Castilian in
America. The study of the language was a cult with
Cuervo who lived for long years in Paris a bookish recluse.
His house was a shrine to be visited by Spanish Americans
pretending to a love of letters.

To the modernista movement of recent years Colombia
had the honor of contributing Jose Asuncion Silva (1860-
96). Though contemporary to its inception, Silva's in-
ventions and experiments in rhythm were eagerly taken
up by others who made them widely known. At the same
time the music of his lines, their originality of conception,
their intimate reflection of an artist's personality have
made his poems worthy to rank with the best productions
of the modernista school. Through them Silva has done
his part in sustaining the reputation which Colombia
has long enjoyed for the high quality of the poetry written
by her sons.

CHAPTER X

VENEZUELA

Literature in Venezuela reflects the progress of its
people toward a higher state of culture. During the
colonial period perhaps the most backward of the Spanish
colonies, it suff^ered acutely from the Spanish policy of
maintaining the Creoles in ignorance. An evidence of
this is the fact that there was no printing press in the
colony until one was brought there by the revolutionist
Francisco Miranda in 1806 as an auxiliary weapon against
the Spaniards. Among Miranda's two hundred foreign
volunteers were two typesetters who printed on October 24,
1806, the first number of La Gaceta de Caracas, This was
the first of the many periodicals that have since offered
their welcoming pages to Venezuelan writers.

The influence of the press must not be overlooked in a
study of their literary production. Without a public
to encourage an author by the purchase of his books,
the only channel for the dissemination of his ideas was
the periodical. Though the early journals were almost
wholly political, the literary section soon became impor-
tant. In time periodicals devoted mainly to letters were
published.

In point of time the earliest Venezuelan to achieve
fame as an author was Andres Bello, who wrote his first
poems before leaving the country on his political mission

305

3o6 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

to England. As he never returned to the land of his birth
but produced his most influential work in Chile, he may
best be considered as an adopted son of that land. Bello*s
Venezuelan poems were either translations or imitations
of Virgil and Horace.

They were written during the period of his social inter-
course with the brothers Luis and Franciso Javier Us-
tariz, who maintained in their house a sort of literary
society. The literary exercises of their coterie, of Miguel
Jose Sanz and Jose Luis Ramos, written in the most frigid
classical manner, were slight and have been forgotten.

After Bello the Venezuelan of widest reputation in
letters is Rafael Maria Barak (1810-60). His youth and
his family connections having thrown him in the way of
learning much about the history of his country, he was
inspired to write his Historia Antigua y Moderna de Vene-
zuela. In order to print this work he went to Paris in
1 841 and two years later took up his residence definitely
in Madrid. He became one of the literar^^ lights of the
capital, was elected a member of the Spanish Academy,
and appointed director of the government printing office
and editor of the official gazette. In addition to his other
labors he rendered a real service to the lexicography of
the Spanish language by compiling a Diccionario de Gali-
cismos, 1855.

As a poet Baralt followed closely the classical tradition.
His desire to combat the extravagances of the romantic
school led him often into the archaic and the obscure.
His sonnets and odes were written on such topics as La
Anunciaciouy A Espana^ AdiSs a la Patrta, A Colon.

The ode to Columbus is a masterpiece. The poet ad-

VENEZUELA 307

dresses the great mariner as if trying to warn him against
his contemplated journey to the West. "Dost not see
that ocean, man, and sky oppose?" The results of the
venture will be a new world filled with such marvels as
the river Amazon, the Andes, the condor, the wealth of
the Incas. The King of Portugal lost his opportunity,
but Isabella turned her jewels into empires. As a reward
for the navigator King Ferdinand's crown would scarcely
be sufficient. What he will receive beside the palm of
triumph is nothing but vile chains. His real reward will
be the grateful esteem of the new world. The artistic
workmanship of this ode merits a permanent place in
Spanish literature for Barak.

Of the same age was Fermin Toro (1807-65). He was a
politician from boyhood, gifted with notable ability as
an orator. At the age of twenty-five he went to London
as secretary to the legation of Venezuela. After his return,
though employed by the government in various capacities,
he took an active interest in furthering the cause of educa-
tion. In 1846 he was sent to Europe as minister pleni-
potentiary in Great Britain, France and Spain. From
the latter he obtained a ratification of the treaty con-
firming the independence of Venezuela. The following
year there occurred a revolution which retired him to
private life for ten years. Then he was again sent to
negotiate treaties with Spain and Italy.

Actively participating in the life of his time, Toro's
literary work has two diverse aspects. To his friends
of the classical school he offered the Silva a la Zona tor-
rida and the conceits of Anacreontics like La Ninfa del
Anauco. For the romanticists he pointed out a new field,

308 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

the aborigines of Venezuela, whose fate at the cruel hands
of the Spanish conquerors he lamented in a series of frag-
mentary elegies entitled Hecatonfonia, In the romantic
manner also he wrote the tales, La Viuda de Corinto,
and los Martires. The latter is a story of the un-Christian
charity with which an unfortunate woman in London
may be treated by a class of society that prides itself
on being the most cultured in the world.

The romantic movement of European literature had its
followers in Venezuela, where it may be considered in
full swing at the time of the arrival in that country as
Spanish minister of Jose Heriberto Garcia de Quevedo
(i 8 19-71). Coming with the prestige of being the col-
laborator of the Spanish poet Zorrilla as well as the author
of poems, plays and novels of his own invention, he was
warmly received in Caracas and claimed by the Venezue-
lans as a native son. As a matter of fact he was six years
old when he was taken by his tory father to the island
of Puerto Rico and later to Spain where he was educated
and continued to live. His sojourn in Venezuela lasted
but a few months, so, whatever his influence in promoting
the Zorrillan legend, the story of his literary labors belongs
more properly to Castilian literature.

On the other hand, Jose Antonio Maitin (1804-74) and
Abigail Lozano (1823-66) were the standard bearers of
romanticism in their land and both were widely read
throughout Spanish America. The former sought his
inspiration in the luxuriance of the nature about him;
while the latter was more popular among his countrymen
because he wrote heroic verses full of lyric movement and
enthusiasm for the national heroes. But Lozano is well-

VENEZUELA 309

nigh forgotten now, whereas the personality of "the
poet of the Choroni," as Maitin was called, still lives in
his verses redolent of the damp American forest.

The exact date of Maitin's birth is uncertain, but he
was old enough to remember his family's flight to Cuba
from the revolution in 181 2. He returned to Venezuela,
however, and from 1824 to 1826 was an attache of the
legation in London, where he must have come into con-
tact with Andres Bello and Fernandez Madrid. His
verses certainly show first-hand acquaintance with the
English romantic poets. Like the Lake Poets, he pre-
ferred to spend his life in the country on his estate in the
vale of the river Choroni. There amid the perfume of
the tropical flowers we may lie with him in the shade
listening to the song of strange birds or watch the changing
colors of the sunset. We may fish with him or read Lamar-
tine at will. At night we may breathe the odors that dis-
till through the brilliant moonlight. From such natural
objects, Maitin, like a true romanticist, pretended to seek
consolation from the deceit of men. His wife's death
gave an opportunity to add sincerity of feeling to the
romantic pose. In a Canto funehre the usual classical
expressions receive a domestic touch when the poet refers
to the disarranged chairs of his home, the dust that lies
thick on the furniture, and the lady's sewing with the
needle still in the unfinished work.

Maitin's narrative poems also have their admirers.
El Mascara relates the story of a thief who gains admission
to the home of a wealthy widow by courting her daughter.
One night, instead of leaving the house, he hides in a
corridor until the lady retires. Then entering her bed-

3IO LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

room he demands her jewels as the price of her life. The
wily widow, however, succeeds in trapping the intruder
and securing his arrest before he leaves the house. Another
tale in verse, El Sereno, introduces the reader to an indi-
vidual who has become a policeman in order to occupy
his mind and assuage his grief at the loss of a bride taken
from him on his wedding night. The policeman invites
a chance stranger to see the sights of the town with him.
They see a lover lamenting the scorn of a lady who has
jilted him. They converse with an old beggar beneath
the window of the hard-hearted master who had turned
him out when incapacitated by old age. They address
an insane woman who had lost her reason when aban-
doned by a faithless lover. She recognizes the police-
man's companion as her perfidious seducer. The latter
oflFers his dagger to the policeman requesting him to put
an end to his existence. Since the woman was the bride
of his sorrow, the policeman is rendered nearly frantic
by the stranger's act admitting his identity. But he
restrains his impulse to comply with the request to slay.
Instead he pardons the sinner and prays Heaven to do
likewise.

Such are the rather bizarre legends of Maitin. His
political poems, overloaded with metaphor and hyperbole,
were not very successful either. On the other hand the
lyrics are still readable of the poet who sang,

A las orillas del rio Choroni.

His younger contemporary, Abigail Lozano, the virile
poet with the feminine name, owed his really great popu-
larity to his patriotic verses. His lines to the national

VENEZUELA 3 II

hero, Bolivar, were admired even in Spain. For a short
time his talents were used by the editor of a political jour-
nal, El Venezolano, but Lozano soon withdrew his services
and established a literary magazine. El Album. About
1846 he collected his verses in a volume entitled Horas de
Martirio. The romantic pose assumed in these composi-
tions, mainly on the theme of love, is well indicated by
the title. They are wordy and extravagant but attractive
on account of a certain novelty of metaphor and a splendid
coloring. In 1864 he published a second volume, Otras
Horas de Martirio. These poems were written during
a more active participation in politics, for he joined the
opponents of Monagas and after their success held some
political offices.

Another important member of the group of Venezuelan
romantic poets was Jose Antonio Calcano (1827-97), ^^
of whom his compatriots were fond of saying that he be-
longed to a family of nightingales. He, however, was the
poet, while his brother Eduardo was primarily an orator
and Julio a critic and novelist. The saying arose un-
doubtedly from the conspicuous fluidity of his lines and
the ease with which he essayed various styles in imitation
of Leopardi, Lamartine, Hugo, Byron and Zorrilla. His
Silva a la Academia espaiiola was written in the strictest
classical style. On the other hand, the major part of his
poems are filled with romantic regrets and bitterness of
heart. A Orillas del Tamaira offers a series of pictures
taken from the memories of his childhood accompanied
with repining at their inevitable loss. Thus the poet runs
the gamut of the romantic emotions; homesickness in
La Sahoyana, the disillusion of the world in Amor e Inocen-

312 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

cia, the torturing doubts of a jealous lover in El CipreSy
the desire for rest from his sorrows in La Muerte. The
attraction of many of his poems lies in the delicacy with
which he evokes images of the Venezuelan landscape.
In this regard should be mentioned La Maga y el Genio
de las SelvaSy La Flor del Tahaco, and especially La Hoja
to which the saying about the nightingale might well
apply, to judge by the following lines. The poet describes
the place where he received the first kiss of a childhood
love.

Nos saludaron mirtos y palmas;

su frente al sauce doblar mire;

a augurar dichas a muestras almas

canto en las ceibas el Dios-te-de.

Hizonos toldo, fresco y sombrio,
con sus ramajes el cafetal;
epitalamio nos hizo el rio:
canto las nupcias un cardinal.

The lyrical quality of these lines will appeal even to
those who must be told that the ceiba is a giant tree, one
of the most conspicuous in the Venezuelan landscape,
while the cardinal is famous for the brilliance of its plu-
mage and the Dios-te-de owes its onomato-poetic name to
its song.

The poetic possibilities of the country were being taught
at this time by Juan Vicente Gonzalez (1808-66) both
by precept and practice. He was not a versifier but a
voluminous writer on the history of his native country.
Possessed of a remarkable intellect fertile in ideas, his
influence on his contemporaries was considerable. Beside
his Manual de Historia universal^ his most important

VENEZUELA 313

book from a national point of view was his Mesenianas,
a series of prose elegies written in a florid oratorical and
romantic style on men who had died for their country.
To Gonzalez is attributed by Picon Febres the initiative
of a truly national literature through his propaganda in
favor of nationalizing it.

The interesting personality of the man is well illustrated
by the following anecdote. A large fat man, he was
ridiculed for his weak feminine voice, though at the same
time he was feared for his sharp tongue. Once in a public
cafe he was approached by a certain general concerning
whom he had written that the general had set fire to many
towns and was the horror of the country. Facing Gon-
zalez, the man demanded with threatening bluster: —
"Why did you say that about me?" Gonzalez rose from
his seat, "And you, who are you.?" "General Fulano,"
repHed the soldier. "Ah," replied Gonzalez flourishing
his enormous cane, "I said it because it was the truth."

Local color without special eflFort to obtain it abounds
in the poems of Jose Ramon Yepes (1822-81). He was
the son of an old family in Maracaibo. Showing a fondness
for the sea, he entered the Venezuelan navy where he
rapidly rose in rank because he showed great bravery in
the factional fights in which the marine took part about
1850. It seems strange that a seadog should write verses,
but the man had a truly poetic faculty, and was dubbed
by his acquaintances the "Swan of the Lake." To him
the wind, the clouds, the color of the sea and sky mean
more than to the ordinary sailor. In Las Nuhes he gave
a record of the fancies with which their varying shapes
inspired him, entirely pictorial and descriptive, and the

314 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

only words of the poem which are subjective are the clos-
ing lines, "I bless you, apparitions of Heaven." His
fancy again ran riot in Las Orillas del Lago when he saw a
child knock at the gate of the palace of the fairies. His
experiences as a sailor he utilized in a marine ballad, Santa
Rosa de Lima, relating a legend that she once appeared
to some storm-tossed sailors who invoked her assistance
and by casting roses on the troubled waters, rescued them.
In La Golondrina after describing the swallow's flight he
compared it to his own thoughts. To poems of a philo-
sophical turn he was fond of giving the title Niehla. The
prettiest of these is one written to comfort a mother whose
little girl had just died. The poet represented the child
contemplating a cloud and expressing a wish to be one;
when the mother comes, the child's wish had been ful-
filled. In the homelike character of his subjects Yepes
resembles Longfellow just as his attitude toward nature
and the lyric swing of his lines reminds the reader of
Shelley.

Yepes also tried his hand at description of aboriginal
life in a poem Los Hijos de Par ay aula and in two prose
romances, Anaida and Iguaraya, in which Yepes appears
to have taken Chateaubriand for a model. The most
successful parts are the descriptions of tropical scenery.

Though Yepes was more artistic in his criollo verse,
Domingo Ramon Hernandez (1829-93) surpassed him in
popularity with their fellow countrymen. His sentimental
melancholy voiced Venezuelan feelings in such beautiful
poems as his Canto de la Golondrina. It depicts the swal-
low returning after a long absence to find that the nest-
ing place which had been its cradle has beer» destroyed.

VENEZUELA 315

Though it found another fine nest and enjoyed life greatly,
it never met with the repose and contentment of its birth-
place. Hernandez was a poet essentially romantic in
sentiment unexcelled in true tenderness by any Vene-
zuelan. The sorrows in which his verses abounded plainly
sprang from the spectacle of human misery.

The power of eloquent speech is nowhere greater than
among Spanish Americans. The rhythmic flow of their
vocalic language excites in them an aesthetic emotion
incomprehensible to people of other races. To this psy-
chological peculiarity has been ascribed the frequency of
revolutions in some of the countries, especially Colombia.
Would the facts of the following anecdote be possible in
England or the United States? It is related of Cecilio
Acosta (1831-81) that one day after he had delivered a
speech in praise of the fine arts before the Academia de
las Bellas Artes in Caracas, he was accompanied home by
a crowd composed not only of enthusiastic students and
ordinary persons but also of members of the society, the
clergy and government officials. One of the latter, not a
personal friend either, addressed Acosta*s mother in these
terms: — "Seiiora, accept my most sincere congratulations
because your son has just uttered the most eloquent
discourse that I have ever heard.'*

Acosta was an orator and learned lawyer, a clever
journalist and a poet. His poems are not numerous, but
he shows in the two best. La Casita blanca, and La Gota
de Rocio, the same qualities that distinguished his prose.
He was expert at developing an idea by repetition, in
throwing about a common object the most brilliant back-
ground of verbal images. His manner was distinctly

i^

3i6 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

original. The significance of it is not merely in the power
of persuasion which he exercised over his audiences but
also in the influence which his writings have had on younger
men, orators, joumaHsts and poets.

Another famous orator was Eduardo Calcano called
by an admirer "the prince of the artists of speech." When
Venezuelan minister to Spain his oratory was greatly
praised by the press. Though author of some verses,
such as his Balada indiana, he did not write so well as
his brother Jose Antonio.

Everybody familiar with classical Spanish plays knows
the part played by the Andalusian gracioso. The ready
quip and satirical comment were his stock in trade. In
modern literature he is represented by the journalist that
grinds out his daily article more or less funny according
to circumstances. Of this type of humor Venezuelan
literature can show as many successful examples as any
other in Spanish America. Daniel Mendoza (1823-67)
chose for the mouthpiece of his satire the "llanero" or
cowboy from beyond the Orinoco who comes to Caracas
and is amazed at the foolish expenditure of money by all
classes in the capital. Nothing escapes his observation,
neither the fashionable ladies nor the dandies, least of
all the politicians. As a sample of his wit, take the fol-
lowing:

"I was saying, continued the doctor, that in that edifice
are made our laws. — Caramba, Doctor, for such a little
thing such an immense building!"

Of these "costumbristas" a considerable list of names
might be given. The value of what they have written
is apparent to anybody in whose hands their articles have

VENEZUELA 317

fallen, for in them the Venezuelan people live and think.
If you wish to know how the buyer and seller plan to
outwit each other with the advantage on the side of the
seller, read Francisco de Sales Perez who flourished about
1880, in the collected volume of his collected articles
Ratos Perdidos. For amusing portraits of persons in the
public eye, read Nicanor Bolet Peraza. Though these
descriptions of manners are mainly in prose, examples in
verse are not lacking. For that sort of writing, Aristo-
phanic bitterness has been ascribed to J. M. Nunez de
Caceres.

Pedro Jose Hernandez wrote his humorous sketches
of manners in verse in the form of fables, of epistles to
persons and of jocose sonnets. For example, one of the
latter begins by describing a tumbledown cabin suggestive
of the vanity of human affairs; but not in this lies the oc-
cupant's sadness but in the fact that he owes a month's
rent. Or coming along the street one beautiful Easter
morning, everything contributed to his joy, even the
finding of a coin at his feet. On picking it up, alas! it
proved to be false.

Nicanor Bolet Peraza (183 8-1906) became widely known
through the fortunes of his political career. An opponent
of Guzman Blanco he was obliged to live by means of
journalistic work in the United States. As he was able
to speak English his trenchant wit was in demand at ban-
quets and other public occasions, so that for a time he was
to North Americans a representative Spanish American.
He used to urge his fellow countrymen to strive for the
blessings of peace and industry, such as were enjoyed
by the people of the United States. Besides his numerous

3i8 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

journalistic articles both amusing and serious in character
he wrote a play Luchas del Honor which was enthusias-
tically received in Caracas.

Antonio Guzman Blanco (1830-99), though he ruled
Venezuela as a tyrant directly or through puppets for about
twenty-five years, was a great civilizing force. He was
able by rigorous measures to put an end to a long-standing
anarchy in the country. He reestablished Venezuelan
finances by the successful contraction of a loan in London
and by rigid economies in the internal administration of
the country. In the matter of education he wished for
"a school in every street." Though his vanity made him
somewhat ridiculous by reason of the many statues of
himself which he erected, from 1872 on he brought a large
measure of material prosperity to Venezuela. Under his
regime literature flourished. During the seventies it was
somewhat artificial in character, but with the introduction
of liberal studies at the University of Caracas, and the
teaching of the theory of evolution fostered by Guzman
Blanco, the younger generation was able to comprehend
and adapt the new tendencies in literature of which Zola
and the naturalistic school were sponsors.

In 1869 was established in Caracas the Academia de
Ciencias sociales y de Bellas Letras which, to celebrate its
foundation, offered a prize for an ode on La Libertad del
Viejo Mundo. The title shows the trend which romanti-
cism had taken under the leadership of Victor Hugo him-
self. He developed and practiced the theory that lit-
erature should place itself at the social service of mankind.
Accordingly odes on abstract topics became the fashion.
The first prize in the contest of the Academia was awarded

VENEZUELA 319

to Heraclio de la Guardia (i 829-1907). Later he was pre-
sented with a gold medal by the University of Caracas for
an ode to science. The totality of Guardia's verses is
large, but their tone is not so frigid as their titles would
indicate. Like every Venezuelan poet he could sing the
beauties of tropical nature.

Another winner of academic poetry was Francisco
Guaycaypuro Pardo (1829-82) whose odes, La Gloria del
Libertadofy El Poder de la Idea and El Porvenir de America
carried off prizes in the years 1872, '75 and '77. But
Pardo, though not equalling the originality of Yepes, had
something of the poetic feeling which distinguished the
latter, "the swan of the lake." This is apparent in the
descriptions of nature in Las Indianas. With greater
unity of substance, these poems would compare favorably
with Longfellow's Hiawatha, by which they seem to be
inspired.

Academic poetry tended to an epic accent and glorifica-
tion of America. In Venezuela, this was furthered by the
centenary of Bolivar, celebrated in 1883 with great pomp
by Guzman Blanco, "the Regenerator," as he styled him-
self; in contrast with the Liberator. To this epic tendency
were due many poems such as La Colombiada and La
Boliviada by Felipe Tejera, though not all were so ambi-
tious in scope. The tendency to philosophize which marks
academic poetry took an original turn toward the end of
the decade of the seventies, through imitation of the
German poet Heine and his Spanish adapter Becquer.
Becquerista verse was immensely popular throughout
Spanish America. In Venezuela it was made known by
Juan Antonio Perez Bonalde (1846-92).

320 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

In 1877 appeared his first volume entitled Estrofas,
These were mainly translations of Heine's poems. Besides
them, Perez Bonalde translated Poe's Raven in a masterly
manner. But he was not merely a translator, for in
original work Perez Bonalde must be reckoned among
Venezuela's greatest poets. He excelled in verse expressing
purely human sentiments. His Vuelta a la Patria con-
tained sublime words on a topic which appeals to the hearts
of all Spanish Americans. In Flor, dedicated to his daugh-
ter Flor, snatched from him by death, he rebelled against
the cruel fate of sudden death, which threatens all human-
ity. Perez Bonalde's fame is however mainly grounded on
his Poema del Niagara written in 1880.

In the opening lines the poet challenged comparison
with the " Poet of Niagara," the Cuban Heredia. We can
do no better than to accept in this matter the judgment
of the Cuban orator, Jose Marti, who contributed to the
second edition of the poem a preface beginning: "This
man who comes with me is a grandee, though not of Spain,
and he comes with his hat on: he is Juan Antonio Perez
Bonalde, who has written the Poem on Niagara. And if
you ask me more about him, curious passer-by, I will tell
thee that he measured his strength with a giant, and did
not come away hurt, but with his lyre on his shoulder and
with something like an aureole of triumph on his brow.
Do not ask more, for it is sufficient proof of greatness to
have dared measure one's strength with giants; because
the merit is not in the outcome of the attack, although this
man returned in good condition from the struggle, but in
the courage to attack."

In the poem, after describing the smoothly flowing river

VENEZUELA 3 21

above the falls, the poet arrives at the rush of waters upon
the rocks, the foam, the rain of diamonds, the rising vapors.
He demands to know where is the deity of the falls. He
entreats Virgil to lead him, because it is the poet's business
to be a leader and conquer time and death. As the Man-
tuan makes no reply, the poet urges himself forward to
solve the mystery. He propounds three questions to
which Echo gives answers. "Terrible genius of the torrent,
whither goes mortal man?" And Echo responds, "To the
tomb." "Is the tomb the end? what remains?" "Noth-
ing." "Then why the struggle? will man ever know the
secret of Being?" "Never." Farewell, cries the poet,
your secret is the same as the thinker's; rebellion, doubt,
the agony of the heart in tears. As the poet emerges from
behind the falls he shouts Hosanna! at the beauty of the
light, and turning again to the rushing waters, he says you
are Hke man on an enormous scale, as ignorant as he. You
issue pure and beautiful, but like the child fall into sin.
You have your crown of iris, man has the iris of love and
hope. In winter all is frozen about you but the torrent,
just so man has poetry, his constant aspirations, the ideal.
Some day you will disappear in a grand cataclysm. I too
with my lyre will pass away.

The immediate disciple in this sort of verse was Miguel
Sanchez Pesquera (bom 185 1). In his early poems he
sang passionate love, but attracted by Heine's lieder, he
wrote excellent verses of the type which draw a moral by
means of dramatic anecdote or dramatic setting. La
Tumba del Marino begins : — He is dead ! They say on the
ship speeding to distant Spain. Into the water with him,
exclaims indifferently the captain. And the poet envies

322 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

the ship wishing he might throw his dead heart into the
waters. El ultimo Pensamiento de Weher is a poetic inter-
pretation of a musical composition much admired by Ven-
ezuelans. "Virgins, listen," the poet cries, and they
hearken to a rhapsody on the transitoriness of human life.

The theory of poetics which makes beauty the supreme
object of art, while the personality of the artist is subor-
dinated to the point of disappearance, sometimes called
the Parnassian school, as exemplified in Leconte de L'Isle
and the French poet, J. M. Heredia, had its followers
in Venezuela toward the end of the nineteenth century.
Jacinto Gutierrez Coll and Manuel Fombona Palacio
were perhaps its two closest adherents. But the spirit
of individuality is too keenly felt by Spanish Americans to
be long subordinated. Moreover, the modernista move-
ment soon changed the direction of the poetic current.
Men like Gonzalo Picon Febres, Andres Mata, and Ga-
briel Mufioz, who began to write in the Parnassian style
became modemistas.

Manuel Fombona Palacio (1857-1903), achieved a
reputation for correctness of diction. By temperament,
he was a classic as is evident in his odes A Andalucia and
A la Muerte de Alfonso XII, which are read for their
excellence of form. A later poem with its Latin title
Hannibal ante portas is purely Parnassian, as it depicts
the alarm of the citizens of Rome at the news of Hannibal's
latest triumphs.

Gabriel E. Muiioz strove to give his poems an Attic
intonation and published them under the title Helenicas.
One of them. El Himno de las Bacantes, won widespread
popularity in Spanish America.

VENEZUELA 323

Andres Mata with similar intent named his productions
Pentelicas, suggestive of the cold beauty of a classic
marble. But some of them were written under the spell of
the Mexican fire-eater, Diaz Miron. Consequently Mata
sings his struggles and personal triumphs with manly
vigor. Nor is there anything cold about the little poem
Del Pasado, in which he relates the memory of a youthful
kiss bestowed on a barefoot maiden beside a spring.

Manuel Pimentel Coronel (i 863-1907) wrote copious
verses which were intended to impart a thought, as well as
to be works of art. Los Paladines is a good example of his
method. After describing the defeat of a lion by an eagle
whose nest on a clifF the beast tried to rob, he urges poets
to remember that victory awaits them in their struggles
with titanic forces. The narrative element in his poems
makes them interesting reading.

Literature in Venezuela always returns to nature for
its inspiration. As a describer of Venezuelan landscape
Victor Raca.Tionde was eminently Venezuelan. Even
more a follower of Yepes in this regard was Samuel Dario
Maldonado. In Non serviam, he openly proclaimed him-
self a Venezuelan rebel in the matter of following rules of
art. And in lines of capricious length he relates in La
Gloria his pursuit through a Venezuelan landscape of the
nymph glory. En el Rio Zulia and Al Pastel are other
charming pictures of natural beauty. His rebellion against
classicism led him to use native words and phrases at will.

Another poet to cultivate the crioUo in his verses was
Francisco Lazo Marti, who combined therewith a certain
philosophical symbolism. His Silva criolla is a beautiful
description of landscape and manners in the Orinoco basin.

324 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

The first attempts at fiction in Venezuela were produced
under the influence of the romantic school. The orator
and poet, Fermin Toro, imitated the manner of Victor
Hugo in Los Martires and La Viuda de Corinto.

Julio Calcano (b. 1840), of the famous family of that
name, published in 1868 the attractive Blanc a de Tor-
restella, which has deservedly seen its third edition. As
it treats of the period of the renaissance in Italy it may still
be read with interest like any other historical novel. In
other tales Julio Calcano made his native country the
background of the story and could write such vivid de-
scription as this portrait of Padre Larrea, parish priest
and colonel of revolutionary forces: — "Tall and vigorous,
his sturdy neck revealed energy and determination in
every movement. To see him on his mule, a palm leaf
hat on his head, his soutane thrust into his trousers which
in their turn were thrust into campaign boots, a sabre
dangling from his belt which also held two double barrelled
pistols, was the same thing as seeing the Devil with a medal
of Christ at his neck. When the ecclesiastical authorities
suspended him from his sacred duties, he did not complain
but exclaimed, — *They will erect triumphal arches for
us yet and make me archdeacon or bishop when we win.*"

Julio Calcano was an active figure in the world of letters
for many years, to which he performed an important
service by a valuable treatise on the peculiarities of
Venezuelan speech. El Castellano en Venezuela.

Other writers of romantic fiction were Jose Maria
Manrique, whose moralizing tales of impossible men and
women were enjoyed by his readers; and Eduardo Blanco,
an exponent of the fantastic and miraculous. His Zdratey

VENEZUELA 325

published in 1882, the story of a Venezuelan bandit, was
transitional to the realism coming into vogue.

About 1880 the younger generation in Venezuela began
reading Zola. At the same time the professors in the
University of Caracas, supported by President Guzman
Blanco, were teaching the elements of the Darwinian
theory. Very soon the conflict of the new scientific ideas
with the old order was reflected in fiction, while a heated
controversy raged about Zola and the naturalistic school.

Among the first students of Zola was Tomas Michelena
whose realistic tale Debora, 1884, argued the social neces-
sity of divorce. Other tales were more psychological in
character, as La Hebrea^ which attempts to disclose the
result of the marriage of Sara with Raul, a freethinker.

The psychological story in the manner of Bourget was
practiced by Jose Gil Fortoul. His autobiographical
Julian was followed by ildilio? This latter concerns
Enrique, a precocious youth, who has heard his professor
say that the sun is fixed in space while the earth swings
about it; but he remembers that the parish priest in re-
lating the story of Joshua had said that the patriarch
stopped the sun three hours in its course. The doubt
in which this conflict of statement plunged the lad of
fifteen made him "beat the earth, pluck handfuls of grass,
perspire, gesticulate." Enrique is in love with Isabel,
who is struck by lightning and he rebels against God,
but instead of being morally ruined, he is filled with
fresh energy to pursue his studies. A third story, Pasiones,
attempts to reveal the mental attitude of the young men,
during the last years of Guzman Blanco's rule. Gil Fortoul
had himself been imprisoned for his utterances on public

326 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

questions. He has since become a learned man, whose
Historia constitucional de Venezuela is an authority on the
subject and places the author among the leading men of
his country. This history was written with great care and
deliberation. Begun when Gil Fortoul was in the diplo-
matic service of Venezuela, a pension from the govern-
ment enabled him to complete and publish it. In the
opinion of a competent critic, R. Blanco Fombona, "it
is the most complete, most attractive, and most worth
reading of any general history of Venezuela."

The sensuality of Zola is reflected in the tales of exotic
manners by Pedro Cesar Dominici, and in the novels of
Venezuelan life by Rafael Cabrera Malo and Arevalo
Gonzalez. But the manners depicted in these imitations
of French fiction are not racy to the soil of Venezuela like
those described by other novelists. Somehow in Venezuela
though a movement in literature may come from outside,
it very soon adapts itself to the genius of the country.
" Thus in 1890 written according to naturalistic methods,
so true to Venezuelan life and dialect that it is difficult
for anybody not a Venezuelan to understand, was pub-
lished Peonia, by Manuel Romero Garcia. The author
announced as his purpose "to photograph a social condi-
tion," namely, family life in the rural parts of Venezuela
during Guzman Blanco's regime. The chief character,
Carlos, who tells the story, has just graduated from the
university as a doctor of law. Therefore he is invited
from the city to visit an uncle on his plantation in order
to assist him in settling a boundary dispute. The young
man finds there a dreadful state of affairs. His uncle is a
brutal tyrant who not only maltreats his servants and

VENEZUELA 327

employees but even beats his wife and children with a
rawhide whip. The oldest daughter has a love intrigue
with a man beneath her social position who eventually
sets fire to the house and shoots her father. The various
incidents of the story introduce many customs of the
country. The bad moral conditions depicted are ascribed
by Romero Garcia to two facts, one that the laws of
Venezuela do not admit of divorce, and the other the
persistence of the old Roman tradition in the household
that the father's word is law. "We have in the home,"
he says, "an odious dictatorship, a school in which slaves
are trained for political dictatorships."

Peonia launched the nationalistic or "criollo" movement
in fiction. It was helped by the establishment in Caracas
about the same time of El Cojo ilustrado^ a review whose
pages were open to the publication of Creole stories. The
honor of being the first to write short stories in this new
form of art is attributed to Luis Urbaneja Achelpohl.
Others who have published collections are Rafael Bolivar
and Rufino Blanco Fombona.

As some of the latter's tales were translated into French
they have had a wide circulation. Blanco Fombona
began his literary career by writing verses. Political
conditions compelled him to leave Venezuela, but he was
later Venezuelan consul in Amsterdam. When fortune
brought him to Paris he published sketches of travel in
Mas alia de los Horizontes and a volume of verses, Pequena
opera lirica, 1904. In Paris he was a personal associate
of Ruben Dario. As a modernista poet, Blanco Fombona
must be reckoned as the foremost representative of Vene-
zuela in the modernista movement; while his tales and

328 .LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

his criollo novel El Homhre de Hierro give him a high place
as a writer of fiction.

/ This novel is a bitter satire onjocial condijjons in Vene-
/zuela written from the fullness of personal knowledge.
I Blanco Fombona was appointed by Cipriano Castro,
governor of the territory of Amazonas, which in his own
words "is as wild as in the days of the conquistadores
and its population has the reputation of assassinating
governors." Having defended himself against an armed
attack, he was criminally accused and put in prison. There
in 1905 he wrote El Homhre de Hierro. The title is the
nickname given to Crispin Luz for his extraordinary appli-
cation to business and fidelity to his employer. The latter
is portrayed as the type of the unscrupulous foreigner
exploiting the commerce of Venezuela. Crispin, how-
ever, wins but little reward from him and after Crispin's
death, his widow's lament consists merely of the exclama-
tion, "Poor Crispin, always so busy!" Social life in Ven-
ezuela, the smart and sarcastic conversation of certain
types, the priests, the pious women, the general idleness,
even the earthquakes and the revolutions are brilliantly
«satiri7,pd. The revolutions are shown to be often the prod-
uct of some man's personal vanity like that of Joaquin Luz
who appears on the family estate at the head of a band
of men whom he has persuaded to follow him. His gaudy
uniform contrasts with their ragged clothes while the
absurdity of his pretensions is revealed in the harangue
which he makes them. "Redeemers! Let us depart
for war. Our cause demands it. Our country needs it.
Let us abandon our homes. Let us sacrifice our lives to
overthrow tyranny and restore law and justice. Weapons

VENEZUELA 329

the enemy has. Take them away from him. Hurrah
for the revolution." The harm which such action as
Joaquin's brings on his family is depicted in the arrival
of the government troops a few moments after the de-
parture of the "redeemers." The soldiers shoot a harm-
less countryman, the cook's son, the only man left on
the estate, as he tries to escape them by running away.
Then they set fire to the farm buildings, shake the ripen-
ing berries from the coffee trees, carry off the chickens,
the kitchen utensils and "whatever else came to hand."

When President Castro fell from power, Blanco Fom-
bona was again imprisoned by the new President Juan
Vicente Gomez. He brought from the prison a volume
of verses published in 191 1 as Cantos de la Prision y del
Destierroy of which he said, "Every strophe is a monu-
ment to existence, life lived, a human cry of a man who
has suffered." In these poems he retaliated on his jailers.
In one of them he depicted Juan Vicente Gomez in a
frenzy in a forest appealing in turn to the trees, the wind,
the moss, the monkeys, and the hamadryads. Their only
answer is "Juan Vicente Gomez, Traidor!"

Blanco Fombona has remained away from Venezuela
of recent years. In Paris he has busied himself with
various literary enterprises. His critical articles about
Spanish-American men of letters in the Revista de America
and other periodicals have been valuable and interesting.
His most ambitious work has been an annotated edition
of Bolivar's correspondence for which students will always
owe the author a debt of gratitude.

The most ardent advocate in Venezuela of the criollo
in literature is Gonzalo Picon Febres (b. i860), who has

330 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

ably practiced his own preaching. His first writings
were contained in two volumes of poems, Calendulas and
Claveles encarnados y amarillos, titles suggestive of the
Parnassian verses they exhibit. But one long poem,
La Batalla de las Queseras, celebrates the victory of Gen-
eral Paez over the Spaniards. After writing some tales,
Fidelia, Ya es Hora, Flor, with Venezuelan setting but
inclining to imitation of Zola's methods, and a novel
Nieve y Lodo, a picture of corrupt living among society
people, Picon Febres published in 1899 El Sargento
Felipe.

This is a criollo novel of the purest type, unexcelled
in form and substance. Its reading is recommended to
anybody who desires a knowledge of Venezuelan life.
Whatever details language cannot make clear are pictured
in the many photogravures of persons and landscapes.

The story relates the fortunes of Felipe, an industrious
small farmer snatched from his home to serve in the army
of Guzman Blanco against the rebel Salazar. During
Felipe's absence his daughter Encarnacion is seduced by
the wealthy young Don Jacinto Sandoval. The jealous
and rejected suitor Matias sets fire to the house where
the couple are in expectation of trapping and destroying
his rival. News of these misfortunes is brought to Felipe
when he is convalescing from his wounds in a hospital.
Though weak and barely able to drag himself along,
Felipe sets out for home. On arriving he finds his build-
ings destroyed and learns that his wife is dead. After
praying at her grave in the village cemetery, he seeks out
Don Jacinto Sandoval and shoots him; then terminates
his own life by throwing himself from a cliff.

VENEZUELA 33 1

The novel abounds in realistic pictures of Venezuelan
life. The reader is introduced to the " pulperia " or country
store and the men who resort there for drink and conversa-
tion. For him are minutely drawn the details of Felipe's
home and simple daily existence before the tragedy. His
daughter Encarnacion appears in all her finery ready for
the ball. Felipe with the tyranny of a Venezuelan father
forbids her to dance with anybody but Matias; with equal
stubbornness she replies to his threats, "Beat me if you
wish but I will not dance with Matias." The party is
attended by young men from the city who attempt to
lord it over the country swains till they retaliate by start-
ing a fight which in turn is broken up by the cry that the
recruiting officers are coming. In the army Felipe's
sturdy reliability raises him to the rank of sergeant,
trusted by his superior officer, General Cipriano Castro.
He is interestingly sketched as "lazily swinging in his
hammock but observant of details, quick to act but spar-
ing of words, ready of purse and pistol."

As a scholar Gonzalo Picon Febres, doctor of science
and letters, has demonstrated in his Literatura venezolana
en el Siglo XIX that the best and most enduring produc-
tions of Venezuelan literature from Andres Bello's Agricul-
tura de la Zona torrida down to the present day have their
roots deep in the soil of Venezuela. This history, indica-
tive of an immense amount of labor on the part of its
author, is the first attempt at a comprehensive account
in its chosen field; and is rendered more valuable by the
portraits of nearly every writer mentioned.

Another study by Picon Febres of the criollo is his
Libro Raroy 191 2. Though a book on the peculiarities

332 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

of Venezuelan speech completing and rectifying Julio
Calcano's El Castellano en Venezuela, Picon Febres clarified
his explanations of most of the terms discussed by anec-
dotes of persons. The result is a book on philology so
readable as almost to belong to the domain of folklore.

The criollo novel easily lends itself to satire. A notable
instance is Todo un Puehlo, renamed Villabrava in the
Paris edition from the nickname bestowed on Caracas
by the author, MigueTgduardo Pardp. The tone of this
picture of its customs is indicated by the author's preface.
"I abandoned literature for politics. I happened to be
elected a member of Congress and I was stoned in the
streets. So I packed my valise and departed. When I
arrived in Spain my friends did not know me for I was
thin and white — green sometimes. In Paris Gomez Car-
rillo advised me to eat rare meat, but Bonafoux told mo
what I needed was human flesh dripping blood."

Bitter satire of Caracas and hatred of Caesarism in Am-
erican politics also fills Idolos Rotos by Manuel Diaz Rodri-
guez. It is the story of Alberto Soria, a sculptor, who re-
turns from his studies in Paris to practice his art in Vene-
zuela. His ideals and ambitions come into harsh conflict
with the realities of life and the people about him, just as
the fruits of his labor, his statues in the school of fine arts
are smashed when the building is turned into a barracks
by the military authorities.

Symbolical interpretation of a social condition or the
solution of a psychological problem characterize Diaz
Rodriguez* other works of fiction. In Sangre Patricia
he studies Tulio Arcos, scion of a family long prominent
in public aflPairs and descended from a conquistador.

VENEZUELA 333

Tulio Arcos inherits only the family pride and uneasy
temperament. He is a timid neurotic, afraid in the dark,
dreaming of great things and poetry. While living in Paris
he is married by proxy to a young lady who unfortunately
dies on the steamer on her way from Venezuela and is
buried at sea. He resolves to return to America. On
reaching the waters of the tropics he imagines that his
bride is a siren calling to him, so he leaps overboard to
join her.

Diaz Rodriguez is an artist and writes the most graceful
prose. As a critic he continues in Venezuela the tradition
established by Luis Lopez Mendez, Cesar Zumeta and
Pedro Emilio Coll for excellent aesthetic judgment. Diaz
Rodriguez' discussions of certain ideals of art and other
theoretical questions collected in the volumes Confidencias
de Psiquis and Camino de Perfeccion have won unlimited
praise from Spanish-American readers who delight in that
form of literature. They place him with J. E. Rodo of
Uruguay as an intellectual leader of the modernista
movement.

CHAPTER XI

MEXICO

Mexican literature presents great variety of form, not
only an abundance of lyric and narrative verse but
also numerous dramas, prose tales and novels. This
literary activity during the nineteenth century is partly
due to the inheritance of culture which stood on a high
plane in Mexico during the colonial period. The numerous
theaters built at that time even in small towns provided
an opportunity for the productions of local dramatists.
To them the storied past of Mexico afforded a wide field
when the stimulus of the romantic movement turned
minds in that direction. The history of the Aztecs, of
the conquistadores and of the heroes of the struggle for
independence furnished themes for all branches of litera-
ture. On the other hand, the classical tradition main-
tained itself in a steady outpouring of religious verse both
in poetical renderings of scripture and in forms intended
to combat anticlericalism.

/ The character of the population has exerted as much
influence on Mexican literature as on Mexican politics.
The educated and ruling class of whites live marooned
and greatly outnumbered among a rude and depraved pop-
ulation of Indians. The latter are the laborers. Among
them individuals sometimes rise above the common level.
In politics there has been constant turmoil in the effort

334

MEXICO 335

to adjust the clashes between the interests of the property
owners and the laboring classes. Literature naturally
has reflected the supremacy of the one or the other party.

After the separation from Spain the drama was a form
of literature much cultivated in Mexico. The Cuban
poet, J. M. Heredia, won his way into public notice by his
adaptations of French plays full of tirades against tyrants.
A native-bom Mexican, Manuel Eduardo de Gorostiza
(1789-185 1), who had achieved notable successes in Spain
by his comedies, recast some of them for the Mexican
public and made translations and adaptations of such
plays as Lessing's Emilia Galotti. But his literary career
belongs rather to the history of Spanish literature than
to Mexican. In his own country he played an important
part as a politician and diplomat. Gorostiza*s comedies
based on observation of Spanish manners were not so
well suited to please a Mexican public as the great roman-
tic dramas in the style of Garcia Gutierrez.

When the first editions of the works of the Spanish
romantic poets and dramatists reached the book store
of Mariano Galvan in Mexico City and fell into the hands
of his young clerk and nephew, Ignacio Rodriguez Galvan
(1816-42), the seed of romanticism had crossed the seas
and fallen where it would flourish. In 1838 was produced
the first drama of the modem type written in Mexico,
Rodriguez Galvan's Munoz, Visitador de Mexico. The
scene is laid in the early colonial days during the reign
of Philip II. The visitador, portrayed as a tyrant, woos
Celestina, wife of Sotelo. The latter in revenge incites
a rebellion the failure of which results in Sotelo's execu-
tion. At the sight of his corpse Celestina dies.

336 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

To a periodical and an annual review which his uncle
published at this time Rodriguez Galvan contributed
several short tales and various legends in verse. The
tales are mainly tragic. La Hija del Oidor, for example,
narrates the sad story of a young girl, saved from drown-
ing by a criminal who ruins her and persuades her to elope
with him. Surprised in the attempt he kills her. The
legends in verse though tragic have greater artistic value.
In one of them. Mora, 3. Mexican insurgent by that name
loves Angela, the daughter of a loyalist who prefers for a
son-in-law Pinto. Angela is married to Pinto during
Mora's absence. When the latter returns Angela explains
to him how she was compelled to marry Pinto; but, since
she prefers to remain faithful to her husband, she begs
Mora to depart. The sudden appearance on the ^cene
leads to a duel in which Mora is killed. Angela dies of
grief.

In La Vision de Moctezuma Rodriguez Galvan related
a legend of the period preceding the conquest of Mexico.
The taxgatherers of the Aztec monarch demand the
tribute of a poor old woman, Nolixtli. Unable to pay,
she and her daughter Teyolia are cruelly ill treated. But
Moctezuma, coming on the scene, falls in love with Teyolia
whom he orders placed in his royal barge. As it is being
rowed across the lake, Nolixtli attempts to swim in pur-
suit but is drowned. Her specter appears to the tyrant
and prophesies the arrival of the Spaniards who will ter-
minate the oppression of the people by the Aztec rulers.

The same machinery of a vision was utilized in what
may be considered Rodriguez Galvan's masterpiece, La
Profecia de Guatemoc. The political note which the poet

I

MEXICO 337

sounded in some of his lyrics here became dominant.
This poem opens with a description of the wood of Chapul-
tepec where the poet is wandering. The locaHty reminds
him of Guatemoc, the unfortunate last emperor of the
Aztecs, whom Cortes tortured by applying fire to the
bare soles of his feet. "Come," the poet cries aloud;
"hear me!" The Aztec monarch replies by appearing
amid terrifying phenomena. Displaying his charred feet
with imprecations on the cruelty of the Europeans,
Guatemoc reveals the future invasions of Mexico which
will force their descendants to repay with blood the crimes
of their fathers. The poet then awakes choking in a
river of blood.

Rodriguez Galvan's legends in verse and occasional
lyrics brought him into public notice. The production
of another drama. El Privado del Firrey, of the same type
as his earlier one served to clinch his reputation. Having
long desired to travel, he managed by means of his lit-
erary popularity to obtain appointment in the diplomatic
service to South America. He set out for his post, but
on the way was overtaken in Havana by a fatal sickness.
When one considers that he was then but twenty-six
years old, it will not be surprising that his dramas are
somewhat crude in form • and suffer from the defects
common to the romantic school. Nevertheless they
pointed to the ideal of a drama essentially Mexican,
drawing its inspiration from the traditions of national
history and customs.

This ideal was not followed by his contemporary,
Fernando Calderon y Beltran (1809-45). I^ f^^t, the
latter began writing plays even earlier in his native town

338 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

of Zacatecas. Here he produced in 1826 Reynaldo y
Elina, the best of many early pieces. By profession he
was a lawyer. Thus being involved in politics, he joined
the rebels of his state against Santa Anna and was wounded
in the battle of Guadalupe in 1836. Banished from his
native place for complicity in the revolt, his property
gone, he came to Mexico. Here he wrote and produced
his most important dramas. El Torneo and Ana Bolena
and a comedy, A Ninguna de las tres. The latter was an
imitation, perhaps even a parody on Breton de los Her-
reros' Marcela 0 a cual de las ires; but the scene of Cal-
der6n*s comedy is laid in Mexico, and gives a picture of
three silly maids who fail to please a fussy suitor. His
dramas, on the other hand, followed rather the manner of
Garcia Gutierrez and continued to please the Mexican
public after Rodriguez Galvan's were out of date. Though
Ana Bolena treated a topic so foreign to Mexico as the
famous amour of Henry VHI of England, yet it contained
certain commonplaces which the public liked to hear.

Calderon was also the author of a few good lyrics and
some narrative verse. Of the former, the most original is
La Rosa marchita in which he compared the present state
of his fortunes to the withered rose. Popular, however,
was El Soldado de Libertad, an imitation in form of Es-
pronceda*s pirate song; and El Sueno del Tirano, which
pictures the nightmare of a tyrant steeped in crimes. Of
the narrative poems, Adela relates the sad mischance of
a young man arrested as he was on the way to marry a
lady of that name, and shot as an insurgent. There was
an echo of his own misfortunes in La Vuelia del Desterrado.
An old man returned to the site of his former home to find

MEXICO 339

nothing recognizable but a tree; embracing/ it he expired
from grief. Though Calderon's verses place him among
Mexico's best poets, the popularity and number of his
plays give him even greater fame as a dramatist.

Contemporaneous with the romanticists were certain ^
poets who belonged to the conservative and clerical party
in politics. The revolution which resulted in the separa-
tion of Mexico from Spain originated with the property
holding classes, 1 so that the constitution adopted in 1824
gave great power to them and to the church as the bul-
wark of the state. Attacks more or less successful were
made by the liberals on this system during the decades
of the thirties and forties. The loss of Texas and the
war with the United States enormously weakened the
hold of the conservative party. In literature the party
at this time was represented by Manuel Carpio, J. J.
Pesado and others who strove by religious verse to con-
tribute their little to uphold the established order.

Manuel Carpio (i 791-1860) was a physician and teacher
of science, of a kindly and religious disposition who wrote
himself into his verses though these are mainly biblical
stories retold. The most sustained and famous is the La ^
Cena de Baltasafy but he also versified the stories of the
witch of Endor, the destruction of Sodom, the Annuncia-
tion. Even a sonnet on Adam and Eve is a mere state-
ment of fact. Carpio*s suave manner made these agree-
able reading. Originally published in periodicals, the
poems were collected by his friend Pesado.

Jose Joaquin Pesado (i 801-61) was a leader politically
as well as in a literary way of the conservatives, and held
^ See Chapter III.

340 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

various cabinet offices. A rich man, he devoted much
of his time to purely literary pursuits. His many-sided
activities are testified to by the facts that in 1838 he
was a member of President Bustamente's cabinet, and in
1839 he published the first edition of his poems, which
were received with great acclaim by his party. His frigid
mannerisms make them hard to admire to-day. His
verse renderings of portions of the Bible lack the feeling
which Carpio could put into his lines. Pesado's imitations
of classical lyrics, even those with sensual titles, and his
so-called pictures of Mexican life are couched in such
general terms that they leave no definite impression. His
longest poem of religious character concerns the city of
Jerusalem. The poet apostrophizes the city, expresses
his regret at not having seen it, refers to its misfortunes
under the Mohammedans and the crusaders, describes
it as it will appear after the day of judgment, and hymn-
ing the risen dead, depicts the celestial Jerusalem. The
best of the ideas in this poem were borrowed from Italian
poets, with whose works Pesado was acquainted.

His most enduring work and one for which Mexico
must remain indebted to Pesado is entitled Las Aztecas,
These are translations of the poems of the Aztec monarch
J^etzahualcoyotl, who flourished before the coming of the
Spaniards. Pesado commissioned a native Indian to
translate them and then he put them into Castilian verse.
Though the suspicion may be true that Pesado injected
some of his own Christian ideas into these poems, for the
most part commonplaces on death and the transitoriness
of earthly affairs, yet they reveal a grave and peculiar
individuality not completely obscured by Pesado's version.

MEXICO 341

About 1855, the political skies loomed dark for the
conservatives. The religious orders were being threatened
in some of their cherished prerogatives by measures pro-
posed by the liberals. To combat them Pesado founded
La Cruz, a journal which both for its intrinsic worth as
well as for its significance must be considered in Mexican
Hterary history. Its publication was continued till the
clerical party went down to absolute defeat before the
promulgation of the reform constitution of 1857.

A Catholic poet whose verses graced the pages of La
Cruz was Alejandro Arango y Escandon (1821-83). His
work is sufficiently characterized by the titles of his best
odes, Invocacion a la Bondad divina and En la inmaculada
Concepcion de Nuestra Senora.

In La Cruz appeared the first work of a younger mem-
ber of the conservative party, Jose Maria Roa Barcena
(i 827-1908). He was later a supporter of the French
intervention and an office holder under Maximilian. His
originality consisted in a utilization of Mexican history
for poetic narratives. In this respect he was a follower of
Rodriguez Galvan. But Roa Barcena conceived the
idea of putting his pieces together in chronological order
as in the volumes Ensayo de una Historia anecdota de
Mexico and Leyendas mexicanas.

The best ideas of the latter are given in the author's
introduction. "My legend Xochitl gives an idea of the
destruction of the Toltec monarchy which preceded the
others established in Anahuac. After noting the traditions
relative to the emigration, wanderings, arrival, enslave-
ment, and emancipation of the Aztecs and the foundation
of Mexico, I trace some of their domestic customs in the

342 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Casamiento de Netzahualcoyotl and proceed to describe in
La Princesa Papantzin the prophecies concerning the
coming of the Europeans and the symptoms of the great
change brought about by the Spanish conquest."

Roa Barcena busied himself in literary production
during a long life. His last volume of verses was published
in 1895. The legendary history led him to a serious study
of history on the one hand, while the historical anecdote
incited him to the composition of original tales on the other
as well as translations of Hoffmann, Dickens and Byron.
Of his rendering of Byron's tales Menendez y Pelayo
says: — "Seldom has Byron been so well interpreted in
Castilian and perhaps never." The same critic said of his
historical legends in verse: — "I consider them the best of
their kind. . . . The Princesa Papantzin has a certain
prophetic grandeur."

On the purely historical side Mexico is indebted to Roa
Barcena for an excellent account of the war with the
United States which he entitled Recuerdos de la Invasion
norte-americana. The student of literature will be in-
terested in his biographies of Pesado, Gorostiza and
others. Narrative verse like his Mexican legends
dealing with episodes in Mexican history has bulked
large enough to form almost a special branch of Mexican
literature.

Belonging to this ballad type of verse is the work of an
earlier poet, Jose de Jesus Diaz (1809-46). As his poems
long remained uncollected they were soon forgotten and
had no influence on other writers. But they possessed a
peculiar excellence, due to his personal knowledge of
geographical conditions. Being a soldier in the army op-

MEXICO

343

erating near Vera Cruz and the state of Jalapa, he could
place the popular traditions in their correct setting amid
the rich vegetation of that region when narrating episodes
of the first uprisings against the Spanish. The best of
these legends are La Cruz de Madera and El Puente del
Diablo. Somewhat more historical are La Orden relating
the capture of Oaxaca by Morelos and El Fusilamiento de
Morelos.

Diaz' work was not without influence at least on his son,
Juan Diaz Covarrubias (1837-59). At the early age of
twenty he published a volume of poems, Pdginas del Cor-
azon, written in the manner of the Spanish poet Zorrilla
then living in Mexico. But Diaz Covarrubias* place in
Mexican letters is founded on his historical novel Gil
Gomez el Insurgente. His other essays in fiction are in-
significant.

The protagonist of this novel was one of those remark-
able persons unknown to their contemporaries, but famous
to :)osterity. Gil Gomez, according to the author, was
present or associated with the chief occurrences in Mexico
between 18 10 and 181 2. In the intervals between battles
he managed to carry on an exciting love affair, so that
his adventures offer the reader an interesting picture of
the period.

Diaz Covarrubias had scarcely completed his novel be-
fore events allowed him to imitate his hero. In .857 the
liberal party proposed in the Mexican congress a new
constitution to supersede that of 1824. The bitter opposi-
tion to it by the conservatives led to an armed struggle.
The liberals, though beaten at first, reorganized under
Benito Juarez. When the latter was planning an attack on

344 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Mexico City in 1859, Diaz Covarrubias joined one of the
numerous small groups which were gathering in various
parts of the country. His band, however, was surprised
by the soldiers of General Marquez before it was fairly
organized, and Diaz Covarrubias was one of sixteen
executed.

A poet more fortunate than he was Juan Valle (1838-64)
because he lived to see his party triumphant, and even to
enjoy a small pension from his friends in power. As he
had been blind from the age of three, it is remarkable that
he could take so active a part among fighting men. At
any rate his fiery patriotic verse roused them to enthu-
siasm. To those who know his misfortune, the many
lines in his poems alluding to his blindness have a truly
pathetic ring. Especially touching is a poem with the
refrain, "I suffer so much."

The political events of the decade of the sixties were
reflected in literature, both by the presentation of the
stirring events of the period, and in the persons and doc-
trines of the writers. Mexicans term this epoch, beginning
with the legislative proposal for a new constitution in 1857,
"la reforma." The reforms consisted in a liberalization
of the laws, respecting the freedom of the press and of
speech and the secularization of church lands. By such
means it was hoped to undermine the political power of
the clergy. The elements favoring these changes in the
constitution gradually grouped themselves under the
leadership of Benito Juarez (1806-72). His pure Indian
blood is indicative of the character of the revolution.
After years of fighting Juarez succeeded in 1861 in ob-
taining complete control of the government, and in bring-

MEXICO 345

ing about the confiscation of much of the land held by the
clerical corporations.

In handling the business of state, however, Juarez
played into the hands of the conservative and clerical
party, who were intriguing for European intervention by
making the disastrous mistake of repudiating the foreign
debt of Mexico. To enforce its payment English, Spanish
and French troops were landed at Vera Cruz. A body of
French soldiers advancing into the interior were routed
in a smart fight with the Mexicans under General Zaragoza
on May 5th, 1862, an event which was long celebrated as a
national holiday, "el cinco de mayo." The government
of Louis Napoleon retaliated by sending a more formidable
force under Marshal Bazaine and by inducing Maximilian
of Austria to accept the throne as Emperor of Mexico.
Juarez and his guerillas were obliged to retreat to the
northern mountains. In 1867, however, the French army
was withdrawn leaving Maximilian to his fate, for without
the French the Mexican imperialists were speedily de-
feated by Juarez. Maximilian was taken prisoner and
shot at a locality known as the Cerro de las Campanas.
Juarez was elected president in August, 1867, and again in
1871.

The year 1868 witnessed an important revival of letters
in Mexico. Newspapers were established, literary soci-
eties formed and literary evenings held when poems, prose,
articles and addresses were read to enthusiastic listeners.
Beside Juarez other men of Indian blood came into prom-
inence, notably Ignacio Ramirez (1818-79) and Ignacio
Manuel Altamirano (1834-93). Just as their poHtical
activities were directed against the land holdings of the

346 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

clergy, their literary and philosophical doctrines were in-
clined to extreme liberalism. Ignacio Ramirez, by his
savage articles signed "El Nigromante," won for him-

' self a reputation as a Mexican Voltaire for he openly pro-
fessed atheism in discussions concerning the existence of
God. He introduced the study of modem psychology

"* into Mexico. The constructive side of his criticism of life,
a sort of stoic philosophy, he set forth in verses written

\ with care and classical finish.

With Guillermo Prieto and Altamirano he edited the
important liberal journal El Correo de Mexico. Guillermo
Prieto (1818-97) deserves praise for his narrative poems
of episodes in Mexican history. Altamirano became one
of the most important Mexican men of letters.

Bom a full-blooded Indian, Altamirano went to school
for the first time at the age of fourteen, ignorant even of
the Spanish language. As his father had just been ap-
pointed alcalde of the village, the schoolmaster took a
little more than ordinary interest in the lad in whom he
discovered unusual intelligence. The schoolmaster en-
couraged him to attend the Institute of Toluca, open
according to law to free attendance by young Indians.
Again his studiousness and capacity captivated his teachers
who assisted him to go to Mexico City to study at the
Colegio de San Juan Letran. Like other students he par-
ticipated in the excitement of the politics of the day and
enlisted in the army of Juarez. Under the orders of
Porfirio Diaz at the attack on La Puebla he distinguished
himself for bravery. In 1861, elected a member of con-
gress at the age of twenty-seven, his first important
speech was delivered against a law of general amnesty

MEXICX) 347

which his fiery and bloodthirsty eloquence succeeded in
defeating. After the expulsion of the French he received
from the public treasury by the order of President Juarez
the repayment of a considerable sum of money which he
had expended during the war. With this money he es-
tablished the Correo de Mexico.

From that time Altamirano was a prominent figure in
Mexican literature, editing various periodicals and found-
ing or encouraging literary societies. He also conducted
classes as a professor of law, of history and of literature.
His published remains consist of poems, addresses and
tales. His semi-historical novel, Clemencia La Navidad en
la Montana, giving interesting pictures of Mexican life
while relating the exemplary conduct of its hero, a Chris-
tian priest, has reached a fifth edition. Of the many gov-
ernmental positions held by Altamirano the most important
was that of consul general at Barcelona, to which he was
appointed in 1889.

Altamirano's early verses belong to the erotic type.
Later in life when he collected his fugitive pieces in a
volume he combined four of them into a connected whole
with an explanation in prose that he had attempted an
imitation of Theocritus, in describing the different periods
of the day in his native province of Acapulco, while the
human beings who figure in the poems appear merely for
the purpose of giving animation and relief to nature.
Perhaps a scientific interest may have prevailed in his
mind when he wrote La Flor del Alba and La Salida del
Sol since he calls the many trees, plants and birds by their
Indian names, but in Los Naranjos the orange trees in
blossom like the rest of nature suggest love to the young

348 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

man who invites his beloved to "leave her bath" and
"come quickly," and in Las AmdpolaSy descriptive of the
midday heat, the lover begs the beauty "to have pity,"
but "with languid glance she replies with a smile — y

?» nada mas." There is a torrid directness about these
idyllic pictures which is characteristically Mexican. An-
other poem, Las Abe j as, contains the advice to a lovelorn
swain to observe the bees, how they seek out humble
flowers; like them turning away from the proud false
beauty, he should seek the honey of love among the
simple flowers. Altamirano's later verses were more
purely descriptive, and in his journalistic work he was
rather a stem censor of morals.

But his contemporary, Manuel Maria Flores (1840-85),
wrote erotic poetry of the most straightforward type.
Resembling the least ideal of Alfred de Musset's work,
he delights in the physical effects of love. Kisses abound
in his lines; he dreams that at midnight his beloved knocked
at his door; "perhaps at the terrible contact of thy lips
my heart would break." He published his poems under
the apt title of Pasionarias. Of this collection the best
is Bajo las Palmas; and the worst from a certain point of
view. La Orgia, which seems to have been written after
an attack of delirium tremens. Later poems as Hojas
Secas reveal weariness of sensual excitement; and certain
it is that after living a freethinker he died a Catholic.

'^ His vigorous ode, J la Patria en el 5 de mayo de i862y

shows what he might have accomplished in political verse.

Flores is said to be the most widely read of Mexican poets.

Of the same age Jose Rosas Moreno (1838-83) preferred

the grave and reflective kind of poetry. He came into

MEXICO 349

notice through an elegy on the death of Juan Valle. As a
journalist he was connected with various papers and also
essayed the drama. But his special originality consisted
in verses on domestic topics and his fables. The American
poet, Bryant, thus translated one which pleased him.

The Elm and the Vine

"Uphold my feeble branches
By thy strong arms, I pray.**
Thus to the Elm her neighbor
The Vine was heard to say.
**Else, lying low and helpless,
A wretched lot is mine,
Crawled o'er by every reptile,
And browsed by hungry kine."
The Elm was moved to pity.
Then spoke the generous tree:
"My hapless friend, come hither.
And find support in me."
The kindly Elm, receiving
The grateful Vine's embrace,
Became, with that adornment,
The garden's pride and grace;
Became the chosen covert
In which the wild-birds sing;
Became the love of shepherds.
And glory of the spring.
Oh, beautiful example
For youthful minds to heed!
The good we do to others
Shall never miss its meed.
The love of those whose sorrows
We lighten shall be ours;
And o'er the path we walk in
That love shall scatter flowers.

3 so LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

The skepticism which Altamirano and Ignacio Ramirez
set forth in their prose and verse was furthered by the
teaching at the University of Mexico. The clash between
science and religion due to the spread of the theory of
^volution was presented by a student of medicine, Manuel
Acuna (1849-73), in a daring poem which made him fa-
mous by the sensation it excited. In Ante un Cadaver
he discussed the problem of existence. According to the
poem science finds that everything finishes in the tomb.
Immortality resides only in matter. The body given
back to earth may ascend again to life as wheat or flowers;
"for the being that dies is another being that comes into
existence: matter, immortal as glory, never dies."

The enthusiasm aroused by Acufia's poems resulted in
the founding of a literary society to encourage the writing
of verse. It was named after the Aztec poet-king Net-
zahualcoyotl and elected for its president Altamirano.
To the versifiers of the society, among whom should be
mentioned Agustin F. Cuenca (1850-84), every poem
became the resolution of a social problem.

Acuna won a triumph also with a play, which kept the
stage for some time, entitled El Pasado. It dealt with an
artist who married a girl who had been ruined by a rich
villain. After years of residence in Paris, they return
to Mexico where the artist attempts to introduce his wife
into polite society. She is pursued by her former lover
assisted by an equally villainous friend. In spite of the
husband's efforts these men so drive the woman to despair
that she leaves her home and commits suicide in order to
spare her husband further disgrace and annoyance.

Acuna*s own death by suicide at the early age of twenty-

MEXICO 351

four seemed to give the right to those who were shocked
by his bold skepticism. But his last poem explains the
act as due to disappointment in love. The poem relates
the marriage of a young girl to another man than the one
she loves. After years have elapsed she comes one day
upon a tomb. The poet explains to her curious question-
ing, "You know the dead; you know the executioner."

While the mental attitude of a certain part of the Mexi-
cans was exhibited in the verses of Acuiia and his friends,
the populace found their spokesman in Antonio Plaza ^
(1833-82). His was the bitter voice of the mob that hates
and curses. His skeptical sarcastic diatribes won him a
temporary popularity which may have solaced him for
the loss of a foot injured by a cannon ball in 1861. From
different angles Acuiia and Plaza epitomize the ideas and
emotions of their epoch.

Another type of verse writing which assumed large
proportions during the seventies was the production of
ballads dealing with various periods of revolutionary *
history. The most assiduous producer of them was Guil-
lermo Prieto. Several newspapers vigorously encouraged
writing ballads so that some are found among the poems
of nearly every writer. In 1 9 10, as part of the festivities
of the centenary of the Mexican revolution, the editors
of the series of books known as the Biblioteca de Autores
Mexicanos collected the best of the historical ballads and
printed them in chronological order in two volumes with <
the title of Romancero de la Guerra de Independencia,

Literary interest in Mexican warfare did not, however,
confine itself to ballads but also extensively cultivated
fiction. The novel as a variety of literature has flourished

352 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

in Mexico throughout the nineteenth century and when-
ever its theme at all concerns contemporary life it offers
many reahstic details. It will be remembered that both
Rodriguez Galvan and Pesado practiced the short story,
but the example of Fernandez Lizardi in his Periquillo
Sarniento had no followers before 1845. ^^ that year
appeared Manuel Payno's El Pistol del Diablo. The
author was a man of some education and literary talent
which he had strengthened by travel and acquaintance
with European literatures. He attempted a study of
Mexican types, customs and language very similar to
those described in the Periquillo; and his book met with a
popularity almost as great.

Justo Sierra (18 14-61) wrote a novel in the form of
letters, Ufi Ano en el Hospital de San Ldzaro for the first
literary journal published in Yucatan in 1841. Sierra
desired to establish a special literature of Yucatan and
with this end in view wrote a historical novel La Hija del
Judio based on an incident from the early annals of his
province. Don Alonso de la Cerda, justicia mayor of
Yucatan in 1666, having no children, adopted Maria,
the daughter of a woman who died in his house. When the
girl became of marriageable age, it is the duty of a priest
who has hitherto kept the secret to reveal the fact that
Maria is the child of a Jew. Her adoptive father and her
betrothed lover are, however, unmoved in their love for
her. Justo Sierra was a successful and learned lawyer.
At the period known as the reform he was chosen by the
government to draw up a code of the civil law of Mexico,
a labor which he accomplished at the ruination of his
health.

MEXICO 353

His son by the same name, Justo Sierra (1848-19 12)
was a diligent and prolific man of letters, a poet and a
critic as well as a successful lawyer. In journalism he
introduced the light and gracefully satiric French style
of writing, which pleased his readers. For a long time he
was a prominent figure among lovers of good literature
in Mexico. He was the author of various tales, poems
and books of travel.

The influence of the French Romantic novelists, par-
ticularly of the type of Alphonse Karr and Eugene Sue,
made itself felt about the middle of the century. In imi-
tation of the former was written Guerra de Treinta Anos
by Fernando Orozco y Berra. The story depicts a soul
once eager for love and enjoyment, but now filled with
disillusion. It is the personal history of the author who
died soon after its publication. His friends pointed out a
certain beautiful young lady as the original of the scornful
and fickle Serafina so that to her house began a veritable
pilgrimage of the romantically inclined.

The sentimental tale was also cultivated by Florencio
del Castillo who gave to his heroines the most complete
beauty of person and character, angels of sweetness,
whose passionate love ends not in marriage but in suffering
or grief. But the tales have the considerable merit of
presenting accurate pictures of life among the lower and
middle classes of Mexican society.

As a study of social conditions should also be mentioned
Ironias de la Vida by Pantaleon Tovar (1828-76) who
gave a certain realistic touch to his novel by introducing
the argot of the lower classes. Tovar was also a prolific
versifier on familiar topics.

354 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

The historical novel can show many notable examples
in Mexican literature though they seldom can be rightly
called more than embellished history. After the success
of Gil Gomez el Insurgente whose unfortunate author,
Juan Diaz Covarrubias, was so cruelly executed, a series
of similar novels dealing generally with contemporary
events appeared. The story of the French invasion which
terminated in 1867 by the execution of the Emperor
Maximilian was given to the reading public by Juan
Antonio Mateos in a so-called novel whose title, El Cerro
de las CampanaSy bore the same name as the locality where
the Emperor was shot. Its publication was an event in
Mexican literary annals on account of the extremely
large number of copies sold. The author being an eye-
witness of much that he described, competent critics
are inclined to the opinion that his book gives as accurate
an idea of what really happened as can possibly be gleaned
from the badly mutilated and falsified official records.
Moreover, to the Mexican people El Cerro de las Campanas
is the source of their knowledge of the French invasion.
Mateos wrote other novels and even some plays without
meeting with the same success.

The French period was also depicted by General Vi-
cente Riva Palacio (1832-96) in Calvario y Tabor. He
had seen the heroism of the common soldiers under his
command in the central part of the republic as, hungry and
naked, with prices on their heads, they maintained a
stubborn war against the invader, relying for support
on captured spoils even at the very gates of the capital.
He did not hesitate to describe so horrible a thing as the
poisoning of a whole division of soldiers. On the other

MEXICO

355

hand, interesting descriptions of various localities on the
southern coast and the hot land of Michoacan afford
agreeable reading. The author was personally so popular
that the book met with considerable success so that he was
encouraged to try his hand on a novel drawn from the
archives of the Mexican inquisition, entitled Monja y %
Casada, virgen y mdrtir. Riva Palacio was an important
personage in the journalism of his day and known favor-
ably as a poet.

A more fertile novelist was Manuel Sanchez Marmol
(i 839-191 2), a journalist who served with the Republican
forces at the time of the French intervention. He early
performed a service to Mexican letters by rescuing from
oblivion the verses of his fellow natives of Yucatan, es-
pecially those of Quintana Roo and Alpuche which he
published in 1861 under the title of Poetas Yucatecos y ^
Tabasquenos. The titles of some of his novels are El
Misionero de la Cruz, PocahontaSy a political satire, Juanita
Sousdy the story of an unfortunate love aflPair, and Jnton
Perez. The last named portrays the troublous times as
the author witnessed them in the province of Tabasco.
Anton was the typical bright Indian boy who has at-
tracted the attention of the village priest. The latter's
influence, however, fails to obtain for him the coveted
scholarship in the seminary at Merida, so he is obliged
to remain as an ordinary poor laborer helping to support
his relatives. When the French come, he enters the local
guards who on account of his intelligence make him a
lieutenant. As a boy at school he had been annoyed by
the childish admiration of a girl of wealthy parents, Ro-
salba del Riego. Now that they are both grown, he falls

356 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

in love with her but she rejects his attentions. An aunt
of hers, Doiia Socorro Castrejon, however, conceives a
passion for the handsome young soldier. By her he is
induced to desert to the imperialist cause. In a battle
that follows Anton is mortally wounded. Then the author
drives home to the reader's mind the lesson of the man
who has turned traitor to his country through the influence
of a foolish love. Anton, helpless from his wounds, is
finally despatched and his body eaten by vultures. "Who-
ever has read it," says the critic Francisco Sosa, "will
never forget how Anton Perez died."

A thoroughgoing reconstruction of the period of the
^French intervention was attempted by Alfonso M. Mal-
donado (b. 1849) in his novel Nobles y PlebeyoSy written,
according to the preface to his children, that they might
form an exact idea of the years from 1862 to 1867 from
the relation of his personal experiences. Writing years
after the events the author lays claim to an impartiality
of judgment acquired by long experience as a judge.
Maldonado wrote many shorter tales and historical
legends.

Some of these belong to that considerable body of
Mexican literature which lies on the borderland between
fiction and history. The tales of Manuel Dominguez
and Rivera y Rio, for example, are fiction, while those of
Hilarion Frias y Soto and Luis Gonzalez Obregon are
mainly popular history.

Of serious historical students there have been a great
number in Mexico. Carlos M. Bustamente and Lucas
Alaman treated the history of Mexico with a large degree
of partisanship, but Joaquin Garcia Icazbalceta (1825-94)

MEXICO 357

was painstaking and accurate in his exhaustive erudition
concerning the period of Spanish control. Alfredo Cha- — n
vero delved deep into the history and antiquities of the
aboriginal races.

In the matter of biography the student owes a debt
to Francisco Sosa (b. 1848) who has also written much
literary criticism of importance. For literary history the
only work is the unsatisfactory and defective Historia
critica de la Literatura en Mexico by Francisco Pimentel.
Victoriano Agiieros (1854-1911), during the golden period
of the early Diaz regime, attempted to acquaint Spanish
readers with Mexican authors by writing articles for
foreign periodicals. Later he performed a great service
by printing popular editions of the best Mexican writers
in the series entitled Biblioteca de Autores Mexicanos.

The death of Juarez in 1872 was followed by a period
of political uncertainty and turmoil terminated four
years later by the elevation of Porfirio Diaz (i 830-191 5)
to the presidency. His pacification of the country gave
opportunity to a fresh growth of literary effort, especially
in the theater. Like the other literature of this decade
the drama dealt mainly with Mexican history. The most
successful and popular dramatist, who for his work was
dubbed "the restorer of the theater," was Jose Peon y ^
Contreras (1843-1909).

A native of Yucatan he came to Mexico to study medi-
cine, but in his leisure moments tried his hand at narrative
verse and the prose tale as well as the drama. The com-
pHcated and tragic plots of his plays are laid during the
colonial period. The personages speak the language of
exalted passions and are much alike. In fact the author

358 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

wrote too much and too swiftly for anything else to be
the case. However, the public was charmed by the love-
lorn maids and romantic gallants whose tragic stories
were presented to its attention. The titles of the dramas
are attractive: La Hija del Rey, produced in 1876, Hasia
el Cielo, Luchas de Honra y de Amory also of 1876; El
Sacrificio de la Vida, Por el Joy el del Sombrero, 1878; and
many others some of which have never been staged.

The last named is a fair example of them all. Dofia
Mencia loves Don Juan de Benavides but is beloved by
Inigo, the son of a squire who died defending the honor
of her father. The young men are about to depart from
New Spain for the war in Flanders, liiigo because his love
is not reciprocated, Benavides because he has learned an
impediment preventing his marriage to Doiia Mencia.
Higo discovers the identity of his more fortunate rival
by recognizing the "jewel of his hat." Doiia Mencia's
father, after Benavides had taken his farewell, finds out
that a man has entered his daughter's apartment by means
of the balcony. Jealous of her honor and his own he
reproves her and decides to kill both her and himself.
At that moment liiigo who has overheard the angry words
enters from an adjoining room and begs to be slain as the
guilty person. The old man reproaches him bitterly, but
refuses to comply on account of the lad's father. "Go,
both of you, the altar awaits you." Dofia Mencia makes
no objection, partly because the young man has saved
her from disgrace, partly because she thinks Benavides
has left her forever. After the wedding ceremony while
Dofia Mencia still wears her wedding gown, Benavides
reappears, having obtained a dispensation from the Pope,

MEXICO 359

and demands Dona Mencia's hand from her father. A
glance, however, reveals to him the true state of affairs.
It is now Inigo's turn to depart. On taking leave of his
wife he begs her to cherish her honor. Benavides seeks a
rendezvous with the young woman which she, after a
struggle between duty and love, refuses. Again Benavides
climbs over the balcony into her room. Inigo had seen
him and pursuing him engages him in a duel. The father
also enters and kills liiigo before he recognizes his antago-
nist. As liiigo lies dead his nobility of conduct appears
in sharp contrast with the behavior of Benavides. The
latter is ignominiously kicked out of the house.

As a narrative poet, Peon y Contreras preferred the
same types as appear in his dramas. His earliest romances
related episodes and traditions from the history of the
Aztec people and portrayed their heroes and customs.
In his Romances Dramdticos (1880) the poems are original
in form, with few details, rapid movement and clear-cut
characters. Their themes are love and jealousy, virtue
and its struggle against vice, tempests of the soul arising
from outraged honor. Dona Brenday for example, kills
her husband through mistaken jealousy. Sancho Bermu-
de% de Astorga kills his wife in the garden of their house
with her lover and then goes calmly to bed. Gil spends
his time away from home. His wife begs him not go to-
night because this will be her last one on earth. He replies
mockingly that he has heard that story before. On his
way to the evening's pleasure he sees a bridal party leav-
ing the church. Reminded thus of his own marriage vows
he hurries home only to discover his wife's dead body.
About to kill himself in remorse, his attention is attracted

360 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

by the wail of the infant in the cradle. For its sake he
resolves to live. Not less dramatic are the poems about
Columbus and the incidents of his career in Trovas Colom"
hinasy 188 1. Somewhat longer, but similar to his earlier
ballads, are his Pequenos Dramas, 1887.

The "restoration" of the theater by Peon y Contreras
brought about public interest in the dramas of Alfredo
Chavero (1841-1906). He was a student and professor
of history whose researches in Mexican antiquities and
history are embodied in several volumes. The romantic
character of the pre-Spanish period he endeavored to pre-
sent in dramatic form. Quetzalcoatl, produced March 24,
1878, enacts the legendary story of that monarch. He
is a king from the East who has substituted the cross
for the worship of the aboriginal deities. After a series of
misadventures in which he is worsted by his neighbors,
he appears to his people as they are assembled to elect
a king in his stead. To them he prophesies the coming
of the Spaniards beneath the banner of the cross. Another
drama, Xochitly is laid at the time of Cortes' invasion.
Gonzalo Aiaminos, the conquistador's youthful attendant,
is brought a wounded prisoner to the Aztec temple where
the maiden Xochitl is servings As she nurses him back
to health ardent love springs up between them. When
the city is captured by Cortes, the lovers are separated.
Xochitl is sent as a present to Marina's sister. Now
Marina, being the mistress of Cortes, sends for her sister
to come to Mexico. On the journey thither, the sister
dies, but her attendants, fearful for their lives, resolve
to substitute Xochitl. The deception succeeds. Taken
mto Cortes' household, that amorous warrior falls in love

MEXICO 361

with her and decides to rid himself of the querulous Marina
by sending her away. He orders Gonzalo to accompany
her. But the youth had already arranged an elopement
with Xochitl. She, however, fails to keep the appointment
on account of a riot in the city. In this disturbance
Gonzalo is killed. In her distress Xochitl relates her
story to Marina and reveals even to Cortes the love that
had existed between herself and Gonzalo. Marina hands
the unhappy girl a dagger with which she stabs herself.
Dying she discloses her identity as the last survivor of
the royal house, sister of Cuauhtemoc. Cortes in his
grief over Gonzalo and Xochitl persists in his determina-
tion to send away Marina.

Verse writing in the early eighties is represented by
Juan de Dios Peza (1852-1910). Apparently he strove
to be a sort of Mexican Longfellow. Very prolific, all
sorts of exercises in verse on all manner of topics appear
in his volumes, published from 1874 to the Cantos del
Hogar, 1890. Continuing the school of Rosas Moreno
his most successful poems belong to the domestic and di-
dactic type. Perhaps of this sort nothing in Mexican
verse or even in the Spanish language equals his lines
that deal with children, for example, the description in
Fusiles y Munecas of the poet's children, Juan and Margot,
playing, the boy with his gun of tin and the girl with her
doll. But Peza wrote so much that was prosaic and
trivial that his reputation as a poet was injured thereby.
Peza went to Spain as secretary of the Mexican legation
in 1878 and there published several articles on Mexican
poets that aroused an interest in them among the Span-
iards.

362 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Landscape poetry has always been practiced by Mexi-
cans. The classic type was revived by Joaquin Arcadio

* Pagaza (b. 1839) whose greatest service to literature
despite his numerous sonnets was a Castilian version of
Landivar's great Latin poem written in the eighteenth
century descriptive of the natural beauties of Guatemala.

Original verse of a similar kind was written by Manuel

• Jose Othon (i 858-1906), who must be ranked among
Mexico's best poets for his real appreciation of nature's
moods. Like Pagaza he chose for his favorite form of
expression sonnets which he arranged in sequences. One
of these, Noche rustica de Walpurgis {Sinfonia Drdmatica),
depicts the experiences of a poet invited to leave the
singing of arms and listen to the "things of the night.'*
A sonnet is devoted to each experience. He sees the
moonlight play on the foliage of an old and enormous
tree as on a harp. In the distance, the nightingale sings,
the river discourses garrulous and the stars reveal their
respect for man. The cricket and the night birds lead
to the cemetery. Witches and ghosts appear. Finally
the cock crows, the matin bell rings, and a gunshot re-
sounds, suggestive either of an execution or a hunter's
escape from a wild beast. A dog alert for his master's
safety barks. The morning light floods the earth and
men pass to their daily avocations.

There is in this sonnet sequence a certain gloominess of
imagination characteristic of Mexican verse. The point
has been well expressed by the well-known critic from
Santo Domingo, Pedro Henriquez Urena, who writes: —
"Just as the landscape of the high Mexican plateau,
accentuated by the rarity of the air, rendered barren by

MEXICO 363

the dryness and the cold, under a pale blue sky, is covered
with gray and yellowish tones, so Mexican poetry seems
to take its tonality from them. A moderation and a
melancholy sentiment suggestive of twilight and autumn
agree with that perpetual autumn of the heights very
different from the ever fertile spring of the tropics."

The most autumnal poet of all was Manuel Gutierrez
Najera (1859-95), who is the incarnation of gentle melan-
choly. Admiration of him is so great among the younger
Mexicans that they say Gutierrez Najera is the only
real poet bom in Mexico since Sor Juana. Perhaps they
mean that he voiced in a preeminent degree the mental
qualities derived by the educated Mexicans from their
race and environment. His verses, often suggesting more
ideas than they expressed verbally, possessed a rare musical ^
quality. And that marriage of music and words was his
special contribution as a precursor of the modemista
movement of Spanish-American literature.^

In his earliest poems, written before 1880, Gutierrez
Najera followed the Catholic tradition of Pesado and
Carpio. For this reason the Catholic element of Mexican
society suffering severe defeat at the hands of the triumph-
ant liberalism of such writers as Ignacio Ramirez and
Altamirano backed by the Juarez administration hoped
to find a champion in Gutierrez Najera. In this expecta-
tion they were disappointed in spite of the intensely
religious feelings of his typical poems Non omnis moriar
and Pax animce. His attitude toward death is beauti-
fully expressed in his elegiac poem Para entonces.

In this poem he utters the wish to die at the decline
* See page 452.

364 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

of day on the high sea; where In his last moments he will
hear only the prayer of the waves; to die when the sun
casts its last ruddy glow on the green waters; to be like
the sun, something luminous which is extinguished; to
die young, when life still attracts "though we know she
deceives us."

In the technique of his verse Gutierrez Najera endeav-
ored to amalgamate the French spirit and the Spanish
form and thus produce a type of poetry which should be
the flower of romanticism. His success was such that
in the words of his panegyrist, Justo Sierra, "the singers
of all Spanish America awoke in his nest and flew from
it."

In the grace and elegance of the poet spoke the in-
dividuality of the man. For his modest reserve he was
nicknamed by his friends "El Duque Job." His innate
good taste never permitted him to carry the sensualistic
tendency of his verse to the point of vulgarity, as, for
example, in his playful La Duquesa Job, in which he sings
the physical perfections of his wife.

The same grace and good taste marked his journalistic
work in prose. In this he was a forerunner of the modem-
ista prose for he abandoned the heavy Spanish period
for the lighter French style. And his clear logic and
vehemence as a prose writer stand in sharp contrast with
the vague sentimentality of the poet.

In 1894 Gutierrez Najera in company with Carlos Diaz
Dufoo founded La Revista Azul. Without reference to
Ruben Dario's book Azul, from which, however, extracts
were printed from time to time in this weekly review, the
editor, "El Duque Job," explained its title thus: "Why

MEXICO 365

blue? Because in the blue, there is sunlight; because in
the blue, there are clouds; and because in the blue, hopes
fly in flocks. Blue is not merely a color, it is a mystery/'
Later to defend the purely artistic purpose of the maga-
zines from the critics who assailed his adherence to French
models, he wrote, "Whoever would cultivate art must
get his supplies from France where art lives a more in-
tense life than elsewhere." The review concerned itself
only with works of literary art in prose and verse. News
items were rigidly excluded. Even the death of Gutierrez
Najera himself received scant attention.

Frequent contributors were Luis G. Urbina (b. 1867),
Jose Juan Tablada (b. 1871) and Rafael de Zayas Enri-
quez; but the names of nearly every writer interested in
the modemista movement appear in its pages, even that
of the Andalusian poet Salvador Rueda, through whom
the spirit of the new poetry passed into Spain.

Another Mexican poet whose manner was widely
imitated outside of his own country was Salvador Diaz
Miron (b. 1855). His originality lay in the fiery elo-
quence of his verses and their spirit of revolt. He came
from the hot region of Vera Cruz, which may explain in
part his torrid pugnacity and sensuality. Moreover, he
cultivated the quatrain as a form of verse expression,
till he put on it a personal stamp. Later he developed
certain theories of prosody in which others have not fol-
lowed him, so that his more recent poems exhibit a second
mannerism peculiar to Diaz Miron. ^

The landscape school of poetry so ably represented
by Othon has had many followers in Mexico, for example,
^Seepage 452.

366 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Luis G. Urbina and Rafael L6pez. Urbina's excellent
verse is exhibited in his Poema del Lago and El Poema del
Mariel. The latter was inspired by the marine scenery
and fisher folk of Cuba where the poet sought refuge
during the recent upheaval in Mexico. Both poems are
sonnet sequences, pictures of landscapes and life with the
thoughts suggested by them in the mind of the poet.

To the modernista movement Mexico not only contrib-
uted Gutierrez Najera, Diaz Mir6n, Urbina but also
^Enrique Gonzalez Martinez (b. 1871), Alfonso Reyes, and
especially Amado Nervo (b. 1870).^ Writers of verse have
at all times been so numerous in Mexico that space forbids
mention of all.

The naturalistic doctrine of novel writing found in
Mexico ready imitators upon a promising field. Among
the first of these was Jose L6pez Portillo y Rojas (b.
1850), for a short time minister for foreign affairs under
General Huerta, 1914. His father being a wealthy and
eminent lawyer, the son enjoyed the advantages of a
good education and wide travel in Europe and the Orient
of which he has left a record in Impresiones de' Viaje.
Knowledge of his own country he has set forth in his
novels. In La Parcela he offered a study of the morbid
affection for land displayed by the native proprietors.
Don Pedro Ruiz, a rich Indian, has an only son, Gonzalo,
twenty-three years of age who is engaged to marry
Ramona, the only daughter of Don Miguel Diaz. The
latter is envious of Don Pedro's wealth, so at the sugges-
tion of a shyster lawyer he seizes a lot of land adjoining
his own property. When the matter is carried into court,
* See page 469.

MEXICO 367

the boundary line is determined by means of bribing the
judge in Don Miguel's favor. In a higher court, however,
the same means resecures the property for Don Pedro.
Don Miguel then attempts to injure his wealthy neighbor
by various mean and underhand methods such as assas-
sinating his tenants and breaking a dam that impounds
water for driving the latter's mills. During all these
quarrels of the parents, the lovers are naturally having
a hard time, but at last a sudden reconciliation permits
their marriage and an end of the story.

The devious ways by which men rise in Mexican politics,
the eagerness for disorder and revolution prevailing
among the lower classes in Mexico, the peculiarities of
Mexican journalism are all set forth in a four-volume novel
by Emilio Rabasa (b. 1856). Each volume is really
complete in itself but the four relate the fortunes of Juan
Quiiiones, in love with the niece of Don Mateo, all na-
tives of an obscure village. Don Mateo, however, is
carried upward on fortune's wheel while Juan comes
trailing after. In spite of the uncle's increasing ambi-
tions for his niece, Juan finally wins her. The author,
Emilio Rabasa, represented Mexico at the ABC con-
ference at Niagara in 19 14.

A popular writer who followed the changes in taste
was Rafael Delgado (1853-1914). His first literary efforts
were plays written and produced during the great dramatic
revival of the late seventies. La Caja de Dulces is a drama
in three acts, which made his friends so enthusiastic
that they presented him with a crown of silver and a gold
pen. The following year, 1879, he produced a translation
of Feuillet's line Case de Conscience. Living in his native

368 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

province of Vera Cruz, he became a very active member
of a literary society, la Sociedad Sanchez Oropesa, which
met monthly under the leadership of Silvestre Moreno
Cora, then rector of the college of Orizaba. Delgado's
stories and sketches were printed in the newspapers of
Vera Cruz and have been collected in book form. They
are written in a manner that suggests Daudet's but deal
realistically with the types of humanity in his province, as
"el Caballerango" and "la Gata," by which local terms
the stable boy and the maid servant are known. The
stories contain realistic views of the hard and degraded
existence led by the lower classes. Historical traditions
also form part of his sketches written at this time.

In novel writing Delgado began by an imitation of
Jorge Isaacs' romantic idyll Maria. Delgado's love idyll
Angelina appears to be a chapter from the author's per-
sonal experience. Its hero, Rodolfo, is dependent on two
aged aunts who have sent him away to school. When he
returns to their house to undertake his duty of supporting
ihem, he finds that they have taken under their protection
at the solicitation of the parish priest an orphan girl,
Angelina. The young people fall in love with each other.
After some months of innocent and idyllic intercourse
they are separated because the priest recalls Angelina
to his own house while Rodolfo goes to service on the
estate of a rich proprietor by the name of Fernandez.
This man has a beautiful daughter, Gabriela, possessed
of extraordinary talent in piano playing. Rodolfo falls
in love with her, though at the same time he retains his
aflFection for Angelina. Her correspondence with him is
a careful study of feminine passion. At last, she learns

MEXICO 369

Rodolfo's attentions to Gabriela. Then Angelina resolves
to become a sister of charity and writes the recreant lover
a very beautiful letter of renunciation. Gabriela, how-
ever, has paid httle or no attention to Rodolfo and finally
banishes him absolutely from her presence. Rodolfo seeks
solace in work.

Delgado's later novels followed more closely the ideas
of the naturalistic school. Los Parientes Ricos is a satire
on the customs of the middle class, while Calandria is
a picture of lower-class manners. In the latter Carmen
is the natural daughter of a man of the world, Eduardo
Ortiz de Guerra who attempts to repair his fault by money.
She is thus brought up to a love of luxury beyond her
station in life and consequently falls an easy victim to the
seductions of the rich Alberto Rojas though she is being
honorably courted by an honest young carpenter Gabriel.
Their last interview in the garden is very touchingly de-
scribed and is excelled in tragic pathos only by the scene
in which Gabriel is at work building her coffin after her
amour with Alberto has brought Carmen to her death.
This novel is praised by the professor Moreno Cora for
its "admirable exactness" in the portrayal of contemporary
manners, and he asserts that he has known many men like
the sinning and grief-stricken father, Eduardo Ortiz.

The field of politics and social strife is claimed by an
interesting novel, Pacotillas, written by Porfirio Parra
(b. 1855), who is also the author of a long ode on mathe-
matics somewhat in the style of Acufia, his friend and fel-
low student of medicine. The novel ostensibly follows
the fortunes of four young men friends. One of them, el
Chango, rises by toadyism in politics and marries great

370 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

wealth. Pacotillas is a sort of modern picaro who drinks
hard and lives with Amalia without marrying her, some-
times in comfortable circumstances and sometimes in
great poverty. By antagonizing the government in
articles which he published in the papers, 'he is thrown
into prison where he finally dies. Like his prototype,
el Periquillo Sarniento, he takes the reader through various
classes of Mexican society.

In some respects the best writer and the closest adher-
ent to the French naturalistic was Federico Gamboa (b.
1864). From early youth Gamboa lived abroad and was
connected with the Mexican diplomatic service in many
capitals including Washington. His literary work began
by adapting French vaudevilles and he has written several
original plays of not much consequence. As a novelist,
however, he has been fairly prolific and successful. A
volume of sketches, Esbozos contempordneos, brought him
a nomination as corresponding member to the Royal
Spanish Academy. The first novel to bring him into
international notice was published during his sojourn in
Buenos Aires in 1892, Apariencias, which may be briefly
described as a Mexican variation of the universal theme of
adultery.

The scene of this novel is laid in a small village during
the French occupation under Maximilian. A realistic
picture of the farcical court proceedings in which judges
and defenders speak different languages without inter-
preters opens the story. A youth, Pedro, is successfully
defended upon the charge of being a spy though his father
is condemned and executed. The reader's sympathy is
thus thoroughly aroused and made ready to share the

MEXICO 371

intense patriotism of the pages descriptive of the retreat
of the French army from a town occupied only by women,
children and old men. Pedro's defender, the lawyer
Don Luis, a man some fifty years of age, is so greatly
touched by the lad's orphan helplessness that he takes
him to his home in the city of Mexico and adopts him.
The lawyer's sister, Magdalena, falls in love with the boy.
In the meantime the susceptible lawyer also falls in love
with the young daughter of a client and marries her.
The wife Elena and Pedro thus brought into intimacy
succumb to a guilty attraction to each other. The lad
is thus false to his benefactor and adoptive father and to
his first love, Magdalena. The amour progresses rather
openly until the couple are surprised by the outraged
husband, who instead of following the time-honored cus-
tom of killing the guilty ones condemns them to live.
The course of this affair is related with psychological
minuteness in the manner of Bourget just as the military
scenes imitate the intensity of Zola. Realistic also are
certain pictures of Mexican life such as the wedding break-
fast in a public cafe and the description of Mexico City
at night when the public places are full of joyous revellers.
The title of "dissector of souls" conferred on Gamboa
by his critics was confirmed by Suprema Ley, published
in 1896. The soul in this case belongs to Julio Ortegal,
a poor law clerk, whose wife. Carmen, is the hard working
mother of six children. Julio, to his destruction, comes into
contact with Clothilde, a siren, who has been thrown into
jail on suspicion of murdering her lover who had in reality
committed suicide. Julio is infatuated to the extent that
when Clothilde is acquitted he abandons his wife and

372 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

children to follow her. Though a consumptive he works
overtime to pay for her extravagances. Finally, however,
she casts him off. Julio broken in spirit and body returns
to his family in time to die.

Gamboa's ability to write was brought sharply to the
attention of the North American public when he was
secretary for foreign affairs for provisional President
Huerta. The unassailable logic of his masterly replies
to the first notes of our Department of State demanding
Huerta's resignation elicited widespread admiration.

CHAPTER XII

CUBA

To say that Cuban literature is wholly a literature of
revolution would be an exaggeration. But in verses
sufficiently innocent in appearance to escape the censor's
pencil often lurked a thought that was evident to the
patriot. If the word "libertad" occurring in a drama was
deleted by the censor who substituted "lealtad," nobody
was deceived; for a patriot liberty presupposes loyalty.
Again the lover's melancholy on account of his sweet-
heart's illness might be a thin disguise for the poet's
lament over Cuba prostrate beneath the oppressor's heel.

Verse undoubtedly was written with a purely artistic
intent. In fact the bulk of verse produced in Cuba was
so great that its very quantity has been explained as due
to the political disability of the people.

Prose on the other hand was generally a weapon in the
fight for separation from Spain. Though some of it was
journalistic and some oratorical, the censor's eye was too
keen to allow every dry-as-dust title prefixed to a pas-
sionate protest against some act of the authorities to pass
unchallenged. Consequently there sprang up and flour-
ished a form of literature, essentially Cuban in its fullest
development, the political tract. It could be circulated
secretly and even printed in a foreign country and smug-
gled into Cuba.

373

374 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

The first revolutionary, in whose lines Cubans sought
and always found inspiration was also the greatest of
Cuban poets, Jose Maria Heredia. As his work and early
banishment occurred during the period of revolution in
the rest of Spanish America, he has been considered else-
where. While his fame was widespread beyond the seas,
the same upheaval which caused his expulsion from Cuba
brought about that also of a man, Felix Varela y Morales
(1788-1853), whose reputation and influence remained
pecuHarly and locally Cuban. His importance to the
cause of separatism lay, not in the emotional appeal of
poetry but in the persuasive power of abstract reasoning.

To Felix Varela the Cubans pay the tribute of saying
that he taught them to think. He is the first of a notable
line of teachers who shaped Cuban mentality. An in-
tellectually brilliant young priest, professor of Latin,
philosophy and science at the University of Havana,
Varela began his innovations by giving instruction in the
vernacular. In 1820 the famous society, Los Amigos del
Pais, founded in Havana in 1793 and still in active exist-
ence, resolved to establish a professorship of public law
and this chair was won in public competition by Varela.
Soon thereafter he was elected a deputy to the Cortes of
Cadiz dispersed by Fernando VH in 1823 for its liberal
tendencies. Though Varela was one of the proscribed
deputies marked for arrest, he succeeded in reaching
Gibraltar and from there New York. He took up his
residence in Philadelphia and began to issue a periodical.
El Habanero, eagerly read in Cuba. Though this journal
was short-lived, in others he continued to exert an influence
on the affairs of the island till the day of his death. He

CUBA 375

died and was buried in St. Augustine, Florida, where his
tomb became a shrine of pilgrimage for patriotic Cubans.
After their independence was won, in gratitude for his
work they removed his bones to Cuba.

Varela in his philosophical teaching urged less attention
to abstractions and more to the study of things. He
proclaimed the right of human reason to investigate for
itself. He preached against fanaticism and for tolerance
in religious thought, especially against that abuse of
religion which made it an aid to political despotism.

When only Cuba of all the vast extent of Spanish
possessions in America was left to Spain, the island began
to enjoy great prosperity on account of the relaxation
in the rigor of the laws concerning trade. Moreover, an
immigration of loyalists from the rest of Spanish America
swelled the number of the population. Assisted by this
naturally loyalist disposition of the people the wiser and
freer colonial policy of the Spanish government made all
but a few irreconcilables incline favorably toward Spain.
Dwellers in Cuba felt themselves Spaniards rather than
Cubans. Even the outbursts of Heredia against the hang-
ing of the Spanish rebel leader Rafael del Riego were
delivered more as the protests of a Spaniard than of a
Cuban in spite of their possible local application. More-
over, the stimulus to literary endeavor came from Spanish
affairs.

In 1830 when the childless Fernando VH married Maria
Cristina, the Spanish poet Quintana addressed the royal
pair an ode which was nothing more or less than a hymn
to liberty. To Cubans his words seemed an augury of a
new epoch. Cuban poets imitated even the form of the

I

376 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

verses. The society, Amigos del Pais, was moved to
establish a literary section, of which Domingo del Monte,
who was later to be a sort of Cuban Maecenas, was made
secretary. When the little heiress known to history as
Isabel II was bom, the society held a poetic contest which,
being the first of the kind in Cuba, aroused great enthu-
siasm among the youth.

The first prize was awarded to Jose Antonio Echeverria
(1815-84), then a lad of sixteen. Shortly thereafter he
became an editor of a literary journal. El Planted in which
appeared several of the important literary productions of
this period. Though Echeverria wrote other poems and
some prose tales, notably Antonelli, he became more
prominent in later life for his active participation in
separatist politics.

Maria Cristina as queen regent awakened great expec-
tations. In 1834 she appointed as her prime minister the
poet Francisco Martinez de la Rosa (i 789-1 852), who had
just produced his masterpiece, the romantic drama. La
Conjuracion de Venecia. Again in Cuba there was re-
joicing among the poets for they thought the queen regent
and her minister would favor a more liberal policy in the
government of Cuba. The best of the Cuban verses were
gathered in a volume with the title of Aureola Poetica and
sent to Martinez de la Rosa. The sponsor for this volume
was Ignacio Valdes Machuca (i8cx>-5i) more praise-
worthy as a patron of letters than as a poet. Still his
little volume of youthful effusions, Ocios poeticos, pub-
lished in 1 819, makes a date in Cuban literature. In mate-
rial ways also Valdes Machuca assisted striving poets.
The most notable instance was that of the negro poet.

CUBA 377

Jose Francisco Manzano, a slave. He succeeded in raising
a subscription of five hundred dollars with which he
bought the man's freedom. This occurrence seemed so
sensational to J. R. Madden, an English judge in the
mixed court in Havana, that he published an English
translation of several of Manzano's poems.

In the liberal constitution granted to Spain by Maria
Cristina in 1834, Cuba expected to have her part. But
the degree of freedom allowed her was by vote of the
Cortes denied and the Cuban deputies were excluded.
Moreover, the despotic Miguel Tacon was appointed
Governor of Cuba and given absolute powers of repression.
To the conduct of his office from 1834 to 1839 may be
ascribed a rapid growth of separatist sentiment in Cuba.

Coincident with Tacon's administration was the first
flourishing period of Cuban literature due to a literary
circle which formed about the person of Domingo del
Monte (1804-54). H^ was wealthy and allied to aristo-
cratic families in Spain. Del Monte's letters to his brother-
in-law, Jose Luis Alfonso, form an excellent picture and
chronicle of events in Havana during the governorship
of Tacon. Before the latter's arrival Del Monte*s patron-
age of Cuban letters was purely literary, but when the
tyrannous acts of the governor excited his disgust, it
assumed a political aspect.

Poetry was Del Monte's passion though he himself
wrote but indifferent verses. It was Del Monte who
called the attention of the great Spanish critic Alberto
Lista to Heredia's poems by sending him a copy of them
with a request for an opinion. It was to Del Monte that
Heredia dedicated "in testimony of unalterable affection"

378 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

the second part of his poems as arranged in the edition
of Toluca. While in the United States Del Monte had
printed at Philadelphia, 1828, a collection of thfe poems
of the Spanish heroic poet Gallego. And on taking up his
residence in Havana, Del Monte's house became a center
for poetic endeavor.

One of the first poets to receive his encouragement was
Ramon Velez y Herrera (1808-86), who published a little
volume of poems in 1833 which attracted attention be-
cause it was the first book of poetry printed in Cuba since
the Ocios PoHicos of Valdes Machuca, in 18 19. Velez y
Herrera worked according to an idea which Del Monte
suggested in the phrase "cubanizar la poesia." This
meant the development of the rude art of the "guajiros,"
the white country people of Cuba, who, descended from
the peasants of Andalusia and Estremadura, preserved
the custom at social gatherings of improvising verses on
local events. Accordingly Velez depicted the life of the
guajiros, their horse races, cock fights, boating contests,
dances, and love affairs. In 1840 he combined a handful
of similar poems into a connected narrative, Elvira de
Oquendo 0 los Amores de una guajira. This luckless maiden
in love with Juan receives his attentions against the
wishes of her parents. Juan persuades Elvira to elope.
Pursued by her father's retainers, Juan is forced into a
fight in which he kills several of them, but he is taken
prisoner, tried and executed for murder. Elvira wander-
ing about alone is finally found, but when taken into her
father's presence she falls dead. The reader, however,
does not feel very poignant grief at the sorrows of the
unfortunate pair, because he is being constantly enter-

CUBA 379

tained by digressions concerning the customs of the coun-
try. In 1856 Velez y Herrera published a new collection
of similar poems in his Romances Cubanos, but the public
was tired of poetic cock fights.

Utilization of popular poetry was also practiced dur-
ing the thirties, quite independently of Del Monte's in-
fluence, by Francisco Poveda y Armenteros, an almost
illiterate peon living in the eastern end of the island. In
spite of his gift for song, his verses being scattered among
various newspapers which had published them over the
pen name of " El Trovador Cubano," he would probably
have remained in oblivion, had not some enthusiastic
young lovers of poetry discovered him when an old man,
and to relieve his poverty brought about the production,
in 1879, of a sort of drama of his, El Peon de Bayamo.

The most popular poet developed in Del Monte's circle
was Jose Jacinto Milanes (1814-63). Though he began
to publish verses at the age of twenty-three, his period of
literary production was terminated in seven years in
1843 by his becoming insane. He put Del Monte's liter-
ary theories into practice by giving his poems a setting
amid the tropical beauty of the Cuban landscape. Thus
he taught later poets the value of local color. At the
same time he believed in making poetry the handmaid
of morality. In this respect, especially in his choice of
topics, he seems to modern critics to have exceeded the
limits of good taste. A third characteristic of his lines
was his sentimental melancholy. His most famous poems
illustrate these peculiarities.

La Madrugada offers to the poet the beauty of the
dawn, but since he has seen a certain beautiful woman.

38o LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

who, however, scorns his advances, he has no eyes for
nature because the sight of two doves, two stars, two
waves, or two clouds reminds him of his "continual soli-
tude." In La Fuga de la TSrtola, the poet laments the
flight of his turtle dove and though he approves her pas-
sionate longing for liberty, he feels he will die unless she
returns. El Beso presents the poet sitting beside a beau-
tiful young girl "at night in a cool garden"; the situation
inspires him with a desire to kiss her; he goes so far as to
seize her hand but is deterred from his intention by the
thought that, although his own kiss is pure, another
man's kiss might prove her ruination. "I went away in
peace, a tear of sweetness bathed my face." El Exposito,
originally printed in the little periodical. El Plantel, made
a sensation. A critic objected to the poem on the ground
that not all illegitimate children grew up depraved and
vicious. Milanes stoutly defended both the logic and the
morality of his teaching that an abandoned and illegiti-
mate child could scarcely avoid being a criminal. In El
Miron Cubano the author appears as a sort of doctor of
morality who offers his advice to those who bring their
troubles to him. This poem in dialogue form is a series
of observations and criticisms of Milanes' fellow towns-
men in the city of Matanzas.

These moral, or philosophical, poems as their author
termed them abound in touches descriptive of Cuban
life undoubtedly true of the epoch in which they were
written. It was even possible for contemporary readers
to name the individuals who served as models. The local
color and the real musical quality of the Hnes has made
Milanes' poems popular among his countrymen. In

CUBA 381

the words of Zenea: — "They glide along like the still
water."

Milanes also wrote a drama, El Conde Alarcos, which
aroused enthusiasm among his friends. This is a roman-
tic drama in the manner of the Spaniard Garcia Gutierrez.
The Conde Alarcos, a prisoner of war of the King of
France, is allowed, through the influence of the Princess
Blanche in love with the count, to revisit his country after
pledging his word of honor that he will return. During
his visit he is married to a Spanish lady. When, however,
the Princess Blanche learns this fact, she is unwilling to
give up the count, though he has proved so faithless to the
favors she had bestowed on him in his captivity. She
persuades her father, the king, to procure the assassina-
tion of the innocent wife in order that she may herself
marry the count.

Under Del Monte's influence, Milanes wrote a few
verses with political significance, but Del Monte's own
political writings were in prose. He is perhaps the initia-
tor of the political tract, that form of literature so flourish-
ing in the peculiar circumstances of Cuban life. His most
important effort was La Isla de Cuba tal cual estd. Written
in 1836 to refute a pamphlet by a Spaniard, F. Guerra
Bethencourt, who praised the condition of the island,
Del Monte's tract was an honest protest against the harsh
methods of the colonial governor, Miguel Tacon.

It was followed the next year by the famous Paralelo
entre la isla de Cuba y algunas colonias inglesas, by Jose
Antonio Saco (i 797-1 879). The main argument of this
tract was that a union with Great Britain or the United
States would be an advantage to Cuba. The governor

I

382 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Tacon reported these pamphlets to the government of
Spain as the work of "pernicious men."

Jose Antonio Saco, suffering banishment by order of
Tacon, became in a literary way one of the foremost
champions of the cause of Cuban independence. In early
life he was a brilliant scholar, one of the chief opponents
of Felix Varela in the contest for the professorship of
public law, and Varela's successor ,in that chair when the
latter went to Spain as Cuban member of the Cortes. In
the United States he was Varela's partner in literary
enterprises. In 1832, Saco being in Havana, they edited
the celebrated Revista himestre Cub ana. Regarding the
literary merit of this review, George Ticknor, the his-
torian of Spanish letters, wrote to Del Monte under
date of April 24th, 1834: — "I have been struck ever since
I first began to read the Revista bimestre Cubana with the
amount of literary talent and accomplishment in your
island. Nothing to be compared with it, has, so far as
I am informed, ever been exhibited in any of the Spanish
colonies and even in some respects, nothing like it is to
be seen in Spain. A review of such spirit, variety and
power has never been even attempted at Madrid."

The government at Madrid had authorized the estab-
lishment in Havana of an Academia de Literatura; but
to General Tacon such a society seemed a gathering of
malcontents and he forbade it. At the same time he
ordered Saco to leave the island. The immediate cause
for his expulsion was his attack on African slavery, the
source of many evils in Cuba. From his first writings
against the slave trade grew a book, Historia de la Esclavi-
tudj to which he devoted his leisure for thirty years be-

CUBA 383

fore its complete publication. Saco returned to Cuba
only in 1861, and then merely for a short visit. But he
kept in touch with the affairs of the island. When the
political situation became acute about 1850, he wrote
some of his most famous tracts, and again in 1865 when
reforms by Spain seemed imminent he came into public
notice. Even after his death extracts from his book on
slavery served in the literary fight preparing the success-
ful revolution of 1895. Thus Saco's life and writings
correspond to a long epoch in Cuban history.

Before passing on, however, a word must be said about
Del Monte's influence on prose literature other than
political. "Without doubt Domingo del Monte y Aponte
was one of the persons to whom Cuban letters must be
most grateful."^ By example Del Monte tried to demon-
strate the literary value of fiction, but in this department
he was surpassed by two young men in his circle, Anselmo
Suarezy Romero (1818-78) and Cirilo Villaverde (1812-
94). Both wrote with the inspiring idea of realistically
depicting Cuban life.

Suarez y Romero as the painter of Cuban customs is
one of the foremost Cuban writers of prose. By Del
Monte's advice he chose to write articles on manners in
which he should touch on evils that ought to be cor-
rected. What Milanes was doing in verse Suarez contin-
ued in prose. His Coleccion de Articulos, published in 1857,
aroused such enthusiasm for its excellent diction that it

1 D. Figarola Caneda in Cuba Contemporanea, Vol. V, 433. To Senor
Figarola Caneda, the distinguished Hbrarian of the Cuban national
library, Cuban letters are indebted for many literary studies, such as
is BiUiografxa de R. Merchan.

384 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

was adopted in the Colegio de San Salvador as a text for
lessons in reading. The evil which Suarez mainly attacked
was negro slavery. In 1838 appeared his first tale Fran-
cisco, the dramatic story of a pair of lovers, negro slaves,
who for frivolous reasons are forbidden to marry. This
act of their wealthy mistress results in much misfortune.
When the young woman passes into the possession of
the owner's son, Francisco hangs himself. The local
color of the whole tale and especially the portrait of
the old stage driver was greatly praised by the poet
Milanes.

The same theme of African slavery is the basis of
Cirilo Villaverde's story Cecilia Vald'es. On account of
its length and its purpose of depicting the whole of Cuban
society from the Captain General down to the humble
negro it well deserves the name of the first Cuban novel.
Cecilia is a beautiful mulattress the daughter of an igno-
rant and vulgar Spaniard enriched by the slave trade.
His legitimate son, Leonardo, ignorant of the blood tie
which unites him to Cecilia falls in love with her, suc-
cessfully baffling his father's efforts to keep them apart.
A mulatto, Pimienta, is also in love with Cecilia, who,
proud of Leonardo's wooing, scornfully rejects the humble
suitor. A day arrives* when Leonardo marries a young
lady of his own class. Cecilia, mad with jealousy, incites
Pimienta to attack the couple on their way to church
for the wedding ceremony. Pimienta stabs Leonardo.

This novel, left unfinished by its author in 1839, was
completed forty years later. It has been called a photo-
graph of Havana in the thirties, because it minutely
relates real events, giving the names of the persons con-

CUBA 385

cemed. The Captain General is not spared but appears
in the act of granting an audience at a cockfight to which
sport he is much attached. The guajiro bravo and as-
sassin and the negro Tonda employed by the governor
for underhand enterprises are also types of the period.
The rich slave trader Gamboa who buys a title of nobility
and his spendthrift and worthless son spoiled by an in-
dulgent mother are drawn from life.

The negro problem soon after the period described in
this story, took on extreme significance in Cuban politics.
Connected with this problem was the personal fate of
one of Cuba's leading poets who though a mulatto was
received at Del Monte's tertulias. His execution on sus-
picion of being a leader in a negro uprising has lent an
additional interest to his poems.

Gabriel de la Concepcion Valdes (1809-44), com-
monly known by his pen name "Placido" was the son
of a Spanish dancing girl and a mulatto hair dresser.
Following the condition of his mother he was free but
therefore compelled to earn his living. He learned the
trade of making tortoise shell combs. Somebody taught
him to read and his acquaintances loaned him books. A
volume of Martinez de. la Rosa's poems incited him to
attempt the composition of verse, whereby he discovered
that he possessed a real gift of song. A druggist, Fran-
cisco Placido Puentes, supplied him with writing ma-
terials and an opportunity to write in his store. In return
he selected " Placido*' as a pen name. Some say, however,
that the name was derived from Madame de Genlis'
novel Placido y Blanca. He was introduced into the
circle of Valdes Machuca by Velez y Herrera. Thus he

386 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

became one of the poets who composed the Aureola
Pokica in honor of Martinez de la Rosa. Placido's con-
tribution, La Siempreviva, was considered the best poem
in the garland. At any rate the minister wrote a personal
letter of thanks to his poor mulatto admirer.

Placido's earlier poems and perhaps the majority of
those in the volume of his collected verses are occasional
in character, birthday congratulations, condolences and
the like. According to some, he was all too ready to pur-
chase crumbs of favor by reciting at evening parties such
verses as he had written for the occasion. Milanes prob-
ably referred to him as El Poeta envilecido in the lines
reproaching an unnamed poet for degrading his art by
singing at the magnate's feast "without shame or sense,
and disputing a bone with the mastiff." But there is
rich grain among the chaff of Placido*s work.

Among the purely lyrical pieces are some letrillas with
such fragrant titles as La Flor del Cafe, La Flor de la Pina,
La Flor de la Cana. These alone have carried Placido's
name over Spanish America. They are not descriptive
but are little pictures of native life and love making, in
which the words of the title serve as a refrain.

Among Placido's compositions with a historical theme
is a remarkable romance, Xicontencal, remarkable because
the author has quite caught the spirit and movement of
the old Spanish ballads. Xicontencal, a young Tlascalan
chief who has just triumphed over the warriors of Monte-
zuma, is being carried in a litter through his native city.
His eye happens to rest on some Aztec prisoners bound
to stakes in preparation for their burning alive. Leaping
down, the young chief frees the prisoners, bidding them

CUBA 387

return to Mexico with the message that his victories will
not be stained by such cruelties as their monarch prac-
tices, but he is ready to fight him even at the odds of one
to three hundred.

To a talented man in the social position of Gabriel de
la Concepcion Valdes, whose very name, according to the
custom of the foundling asylum which had sheltered his
infancy, commemorated the charity of the good bishop
who established the asylum, life must at times have seemed
very bitter. An expression of such feelings can at least
be read into some of his poems. In the beautiful lines on
La Palma y la Mahay the insignificant mallow nestling
in the grass of a lofty hill is full of pride at her position
and speaks with condescension to the palm tree on the
plain below. With head erect the palm replies: — "Do
you consider yourself the greater merely because you
were bom in a high place.? The place where you happen
to be is great, not you."

His feelings about liberty, expressed with all the ardor
of African blood, are Tevealed in a sonnet on the death
of the tyrant Gessler. It pictures Tell standing exultant
over the quivering corpse of the tyrant and holding his
bow as a symbol of liberty. More explicit are the poet's
words in verses to the Mexican general, Adolfo de la Flor,
which he is to read on reaching Mexican soil. "Go, yes,
go to the shores where liberty is; and on arriving at the
beach, draw forth my verses, bend your knee and touch
them three times to the earth. Since my ill fortune and
the seas prevent my enjoying the divine essence, may
my songs enjoy it. And when you learn of my death,
5end dust moistened with your tears in a litter to some

388 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

faithful friend and that shall be the most precious flower
with which you can adorn my tomb."

As the author of such verses and a prominent member
of the African race it was natural that Placido should fall
under the suspicion of the authorities when, in 1844, they
scented a negro uprising. Moreover, he was denounced
as the author of certain patriotic lines circulating in manu-
script. With ten others he was thrown into prison. After
a sort of trial he was condemned to die. He had stoutly
defended his innocence of any complicity in sinister
plotting and expected eventually to be released. When
however the sentence of death was announced to him he
replied: — "I shall die singing like the Cuban nightingale."
On the way to the place of execution he did recite verses
of his own composition. After his death there were put
into circulation three fine poems whose excellence combined
with the tragic circumstance of his end did more to confer
on him the name of real poet than all the remainder of
his work.

The shortest is a sonnet, Despedida a mi Madre, in which
he bids his mother not to grieve, for his lyre utters its
last sound to her memory while the mantle of religion
covers him. In the Adios a mi Lira he expressed in noble
words the consolation which the cultivation of poetry
had been to him. His lyre, he declared, will not remain
in the dust of a vile prison; he begs God to accept it. He
has dreamed of a world of pure glory and justice which
men do not understand but angels have seen, that world
which he hopes to see within a few hours and then he will
praise God that he has departed from this mansion of
crimes. The final stanza runs thus: "Farewell, my lyre,

CUBA 389

commended to God. Farewell! I bless thee! My calm
spirit inspired by thee scorns the cruelty of hostile fate.
Men will see thee consecrated to-day. God and my last
farewell remain with thee, for between God and the tomb
one tells no lies. Farewell! I am going to die — I am
innocent."

Somewhat shorter, the Plegaria a Dios is the most
famous of all by reason of its lofty sentiment and artistic
form. It was said that Placido recited this prayer on the
way to execution. It has been translated into EngHsh.

O God of love unbounded! Lord supreme!

In overwhelming grief to thee I fly.

Rending this veil of hateful calumny,

Oh let thine arm of might my fame redeem!

Wipe thou this foul disgrace from off my brow,

With which the world hath sought to stamp it now.

Thou King of Kings, my fathers* God and mine.
Thou only art my sure and strong defence.
. The polar snows, the tropic fires intense.
The shaded sea, the air, the light are thine:
The life of leaves, the water's changeful tide.
All things are thine, and by thy will abide.

Thou art all power; all life from thee goes forth,
And fails or flows obedient to thy breath;
Without thee all is naught; in endless death
All nature sinks forlorn and nothing worth.
Yet even the Void obeys thee; and from naught
By thy dread word the living man was wrought.

Merciful God! How should I thee deceive?

Let thy eternal wisdom search my soul!

Bowed down to earth by falsehood's base control.

390 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANrSH AMERICA

Her stainless wings not now the air may cleave.
Send forth thine hosts of truth and set her free!
Stay thou, O Lord, the oppressor's victory!

Forbid it, Lord, by that most free outpouring

Of thine own most precious blood for every brother

Of our lost race, and by thy Holy Mother,

So full of grief, so loving, so adoring.

Who clothed in sorrow followed thee afar.

Weeping thy death like a declining star.

But if this lot thy love ordains to me.
To yield to foes most cruel and unjust,
To die and leave my poor and senseless dust
The scofF and sport of their weak enmity.
Speak Thou, and then Thy purposes fulfill;
Lord of my life, work Thou Thy perfect will.

The three posthumous poems on which Placido's repu-
tation as a great poet mainly depends, have given rise to
a controversy concerning their authenticity. Manuel
Sanguily, recently Cuban secretary of state and in early
life an active partisan of Cuban independence, contends
that the poems are apocryphal, basing his belief on the
following arguments. The poems circulated in manu-
script for some time after Placido*s execution. An eye-
witness to his death testified that the words which the
poet recited on the way to the place of execution were
not those of the Plegaria, but of his sonnet, La Fatalidad,
Moreover, during the months of his incarceration Placido
firmly expected to be released, so that certain expressions
in these poems do not ring true. The Despedida a mi
madre implies that she had lost track of her son, whereas.

CUBA 391

it is known that mother and son maintained their rela«
tions. Finally there is no tradition respecting the manner
by which the poems were transmitted from the prison.

Sanguily has not, however, revealed the name of the
man who he believes is their author; but he has promised
to do so when his book about Placido is ready. Sanguily
first advanced his theory in his revolutionary journal
Hojas literariaSy in 1893, at a time when a sensational dis-
cussion of the famous poet's last hours would direct
attention quite as much to the part played in them by
the Spaniards, and to the political question in general
as it would to the question of fact in literary history.

Placido's death marks the end of an epoch in Cuban
letters. Succeeding poets with the exception of Ramon
de Palma belong to a younger generation. Ramon de
Palma y Romay (1812-60), though he was a member of
Del Monte's tertulia and joint editor with Echevarria of
El Plantely followed in his later poems the new fashions.
In using poetry to inculcate morality, Palma showed him-
self a disciple of Milanes. In the flight of a gull, for ex-
ample, he could find grandiose thoughts to describe the
journey of the poet through the desert of selfish human
society. That poem of his early period most praised by
his friends was an ode on an epidemic of cholera which
in 1833 ravaged the city of Havana. Against this back-
ground he sketched the power of God. The same theme
also served him for a prose tale full of realistic details.
This was not the only tale which he produced, however,
for by profession Palma was a schoolmaster who wrote
continually for the papers both in prose and verse. He
even essayed the drama, and it is said that he was the

392 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

first Cuban to have a play staged. In 1837 was pro-
duced La Prueha 0 la Fuelta del Cruzado. Ten years
later he had the pleasure of listening to an Italian opera
troupe in an operetta for which he wrote the libretto.
Una Escena del Descubrimiento de America por Colon. Of
the poems which he wrote in his later period when the
whisperings of liberty were beginning to stir in Cuba, the
most important was a very excellent translation of Man-
zoni*s famous ode on the death of Napoleon, // Cinque
Maggio, On account of his literary activity Palma fell
under suspicion of complicity in the troubles of 1852,
and suffered imprisonment for a short time.

These troubles were the outcome of the activity of a
party which believed that a solution for Cuba's ills lay
in the annexation of the island by the United States.
The ferocity with which the captain general Leopoldo
O'Donnell suppressed the supposed negro insurrection
of 1844, spared neither whites nor blacks. Prominent
Cubans of all classes fell under suspicion. Even Del
Monte, at whose tertulias the negro poets Placido and
Manzano had been welcome was accused. Fortunately
at this time he was in Europe where influential friends
were able to save him from disgrace. But the stern meas-
ures of the government only fanned the flames of dis-
content.

Jose Antonio Saco from his safe retreat in the United
States sent many tracts to Cuba. He had modified some-
what his earlier views and demanded, in case Spain re-
fused to grant reforms, absolute independence for Cuba.
In his Ideas sohre la incorporacion de Cuba en los Estados
UnidoSy 1848, he opposed the annexationists on the

CUBA 393

ground that immigration from the United States would
bring about a gradual disappearance of Cuban nationality.
His Situacion de Cuba y su remedio^ 1851, showed the
necessity of granting to Cuba an ample degree of liberty;
in default of which Spain would lose the island. He set
forth these alternatives in the eloquent 0 Espana concede
a Cuba derechos politicos 0 Cuba se pierde para Espana.
This essay is now the classic example of Cuban political
literature.

The annexationist party found it an easy matter to
arouse popular enthusiasm in their favor throughout the
United States. Besides, Southern politicians believed
that the annexation of Cuba would provide more slave
territory. In the island, Narciso Lopez, a native of
Venezuela, who had been a general in Spain in the Carlist
war, was fired by the ambition of becoming the liberator
of Cuba. For that purpose he came to the United States
and organized two filibustering expeditions. The first
failed through the interference of the government of the
United States. Despite its activities Lopez found little
difficulty in securing in several cities parties of adven-
turers. It is noteworthy that they enrolled under a flag
with three blue and two white stripes, at the top of which
was a red field bearing a single white star, the present
emblem of free Cuba. Lopez' second expedition sailed
from New Orleans, August 3d, 185 1. On reaching the
Cuban coast, his steamer ran aground about sixteen miles
from Havana. Though Lopez and the main body of
filibusters succeeded in gaining the mountains, an Amer-
ican colonel Crittenden and fifty others in charge of the
equipment were captured by Spanish soldiers, taken to

394 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Havana and shot in the pubHc square. Lopez himself
somewhat later suffered a like fate.

Political agitation in the United States for the purchase
of Cuba from Spain nevertheless continued. Bills were
introduced into Congress appropriating money for that
purpose though without success. Spain's attitude was
well expressed by a Spanish minister who frankly told
Americans who broached the subject that he believed it
to be the feeling of his country that sooner than see the
island transferred to any power they would prefer seeing
it sunk in the ocean. In 1854 James Buchanan, then
minister to Great Britain, met the American ministers to
France and Spain, and together they formulated and
issued a remarkable document known as the "Ostend
Manifesto" in which they declared that "from the pe-
culiarity of its geographical position Cuba is as necessary
to the North American republic as any of its present
members." Buchanan when president continually urged
in his annual messages the purchase of the island. And
in the presidential campaign of i860, one slogan of the
Democrats was "Cuba must be ours."

In Cuba, however, there was little enthusiasm at the
idea of annexation, a fact which is sometimes given as
the cause of Lopez' complete failure. The contribution to
Cuban psychology made by Saco's writings in propagat-
ing the ideal of a Cuban state is the most that came of the
agitation of these years. For a decade the young men
wrote verses with a minimum of political significance.
And during the fifties there was a second flourishing period
of Cuban poetry.

The year 1853 witnessed the publication of an attrac-

CUBA 395

tlve collection of poems by four writers, in a volume en-
titled Cuatro Laiides, by name Ramon Zambrana, J. G.
Roldan, R. M. de Mendive and Felipe Lopez de Briiias.
The first was a man of great culture and taste, a physician
by profession, and a professor of the natural sciences who
wrote much on his professional studies. As a poet Dr.
Ramon Zambrana (1817-83), acknowledged Del Monte
as his "master in literature" during his student days.
To Del Monte he dedicated a volume of his poems which
he says "are stamped by Del Monte's approval" having
been read and criticised by the latter shortly before his
death. The poems belong to the metaphysical type and
deal with abstractions, the mystery of existence, light
and harmony, or the creation. If he dwells on the beauties
of nature it is for the purpose of drawing an allegory as in
the tender lines of La Azucena y el Agua. The water
addressing the lily laments that the most beautiful flower
on her course should be surrounded by brambles. The
sympathetic personality of the man is here revealed. His
popularity due to his character was somewhat enhanced
by his romantic marriage to the poetess, Dona Luisa
Perez (bom 1837), and her agreeable qualities. Their
acquaintance began through the reading of her first little
volume of verses, which she published at the age of nine-
teen. After correspondence with her, for she lived at the
eastern end of Cuba, he paid a visit which resulted in
their marriage, 1858.

The freshness of her poems, redolent of the fields and
the country, must have delighted him. His own poems
have nothing so fragrant as El Lirio. The poetess feigns
to have discovered a lily beside a stream running through

396 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

a valley paved with green, whither she betakes herself
daily to attend the treasure. Perhaps his own little
allegory on the lily may have been suggested by her lines
and refer to her personally.

Jose Gonzalo Roldan (1822-56) essayed unsuccessfully
the elevated style. In a softer mood, however, he wrote a
most charming little poem. El Aguacero; charming for its
tender delicacy of suggestion in rendering the situation and
the setting. The poet explains to a trembling country girl
that the storm which frightens her is only a passing shower;
he invites her to keep her clothing dry by coming under
shelter and tries to calm her agitation by calling her
attention to the phenomena accompanying the rain and
to the sweet odors from the vegetation.

Nature in various moods as reflected in the sentimental
spirit of the poet furnished the matter for the other two
contributors to Cuatro Laudes. In florid language, Felipe
Lopez de Brifias (1822-77) sought to render the music
of the woods in La Miisica del Bosque or the sentiments
inspired by the dawn, El Amanecer. His best piece. Canto
sdficoy was addressed to his wife whom he calls in the
opening line "Chaste dove." He bids her awake because
the morning calls him to his daily task and pray for him.
At work he is cheered by thinking of her. If men should
refuse him assistance he would take her into the beautiful
woods where they would live apart from men on the
bounties of Providence.

Of more sustained inspiration was Rafael Maria de
Mendive (1821-86). Yet the verdict of a Cuban critic,
"Mendive's lyre has but one string," has long been con-
sidered a just characterization of his sentimental and

CUBA 397

melancholy poetry. His first volume of verse appeared in
1847 with the title Pasionarias. Its contents so pleased
our poet Longfellow that he sent an inscribed copy of his
own poems to the Cuban bard. Shortly after, Mendive
went to Europe by way of the United States and during
his four years there he made the acquaintance of prom-
inent men in France, Spain and Italy. He returned to
Cuba possessed of a love of letters and eager to be of
service to his native island. Thus he not only published
the collection of poems, Cuatro Laudes, but in 1853 with
Quintiliano Garcia founded a fortnightly, Revista de la
Hahana. This magazine was ambitious in its scope and
became the medium of publication for a group of young
writers. In respect to its importance and his influence a
Cuban has said, "After Del Monte, Mendive is the man
who has done most to prevent the dying out of enthusiasm
for art among us."

His enthusiasm for poetic art led Mendive to make many
metrical translations. His rendering of Byron's song
beginning,

I saw thee weep — the big bright tear
Came o'er that eye of blue;
And then methought it did appear
A violet dropping dew,

has long been a favorite with Cuban lovers. His versions
of Tom Moore's Irish Melodies earned for him the so-
briquet of the Cuban Moore. He also arranged for the
stage Gulnara, an operatic version of Byron's Corsair.
Original dramatic efforts of his which he made for his
mother-in-law's theater have been forgotten.

398 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

In this theater occurred an incident which led to Men-
dive's banishment from Cuba. When the revolution of
1868 broke out Mendive was the principal of a school for
boys in Havana. In January of the following year there
was a popular demonstration of an unusual sort in protest
against a tyrannical proclamation of a Spanish general.
The performance of a certain comedy in the theater
Villanueva was attended by groups of women with their
hair flowing loose and attired in garments of white and
blue bespangled with stars, thus suggesting the Cuban
revolutionary colors. Rioting and bloodshed resulted.
Mendive was arrested by the authorities as the instigator
of this picturesque protest and deported to Spain for four
years' imprisonment. There, however, literary acquaint-
ances succeeded in procuring his release. He recrossed the
Atlantic and settled in New York where he lived in great
poverty till permitted by the general amnesty at the close
of the revolution to return to Cuba.

During these years he made use, however, of his poetic
gifts to encourage the revolution. When his son had de-
parted on the ill-fated filibustering steamer " Virginius," he
wrote those lines with the refrain,

Has hecho bien, hijo mio,
has hecho muy bien en ir
a donde el honor te llama
por la patria a combatir.^

lines in which like a father who has cheerfully given his
own son for the cause, he strove to stimulate to patriotic
action other Cubans living at ease in New York. An even

* Thou hast done well, my son, thou hast done very well to go where
honor calls thee to fight for thy country.

CUBA 399

severer flagellation of unpatriotic Cubans was his poem
Los Dormidos, "these slaves of pleasure who patiently
endure the whip on their shoulders and fetters on their
feet." If they will not bestir themselves, "let them sleep
on till the avenging bolt of celestial anger surprises them."
Mendive's work as a poet, however, is more essentially
that of a lover of nature in whom its beauties inspire a '
train of moral or melancholy suggestions. The favorite
A un Arroyo is of this sort. Another favorite poem. La
Gota de Rocioy exemplifies the delicacy of his fancy. How
beautiful, the poet exclaims, is a drop of dew; whether it
be on the feather of a bird or on the petal of a flower,
whether on any of the trees of the forest or gliding among
the roses. Perhaps it is an angel's tear. After his death
the mysterious light of a drop of dew will illumine his name
on his tombstone. Some thirsty bird will view it with
rapture, a poet's tear shining on the marble. Mendive's
tenderness is exhibited in his Sonrisa de la VirgeUy of
which there exists this metrical translation ascribed to
Longfellow:

Purer than the early breeze.
Or the faint perfume of flowers.
Maiden! through thine angel hours

Pass the thoughts of love;
Purer than the tender light
On the morning's gentle face,
, On thy lips of maiden grace

Plays thy virgin smile!

Like a bird's thy rapture is.
Angel eyes thine eyes enlighten,
On thy gracious forehead brighten
Flashes from above;

400 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Flower-like thy breathings are.
Free thy dreams from sinful strife.
And the sunlight of thy life
Is thy virgin smile!

Loose thou never, gentle child.
Thy spring garland from thy brow.
Through life's flowery fields, as now.

Wander careless still;
Sweetly sing and gaily run.
Drinking in the morning air.
Free and happy everywhere,

With thy virgin smile!

Love and pleasure are but pains,"

Bitter grief and miseries.

Withered leaves, which every breeze

Tosses at its will;
Live thou purely with thy joy,
With thy wonder and thy peace.
Blessing life, till life shall cease.

With thy virgin smile!

A new type of poetry was introduced into Cuba by
Jose Fomaris (i 829-1 890) and became so popular that
books of verse sold by thousands in Cuba. Bethinking
himself of the aborigines of his native island, he sang: —

The memory of the sunburnt maids.
With slender forms and soft black een.
Who dwelt by murmuring cascades
Beneath an arch of leafy green :
Of stories of other witching days,
Caught by surprise at the Caonao,
Beside Bayamo as it plays.
Or in the pure waters of Arimao.

CUBA

401

■^ Fomaris* Cantos de Siboney are a series of legends partly
traditional but in large measure imaginary. Some are
conversations between lovers, as the one entitled Eliana
y Guanari in which the maiden is reluctant to leave her
home but at last yields to her lover's persuasions to live
in the beautiful valley of Yumuri. The Cacique de Ornofay
is revealed to us disputing with Columbus. The dis-
coverer invites him to see the splendors of Spain and the
Spanish court, but the Indian chief refuses to believe that
anything more beautiful in this world than his woodland
home exists. At last the European concurs in that opinion.
The legend of the Laguna de Ana Luisa explains the origin
of a pool thus named. An Indian maid with the Christian
name Ana Luisa prefers a member of the Siboney tribe to
a Carib. The latter does not observe with as much pleas-
ure as the reader of the poem their wooing among the
flowers but steals treacherously upon them. With an
arrow he slays his rival; then seizes the bride. But the
river rising in wild indignation, overwhelms the criminal
and buries in its waters the bodies of all three. The pool
so formed still remains. On its banks by night the ghost
of Ana Luisa bewails her fate. These poems are written
with the utmost ease and simplicity of style. The author
seemed to be able to turn out an illimitable quantity.

His contemporaries held diverse opinions about their
value. Dr. Zambrana was enthusiastic over the "new
genre, because it leaves the beaten path." On the other
hand, the poet's enemies pointed out that his local color
did not agree with history; that he made no effort to
depict manners and customs; that his Indians made love
and were jealous in the conventional style; that, apart

402 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

from the Indian canoes or piraguas and numerous names
of places and persons, his verses differed little from any-
body else's. Moreover, in the actual ethical composition
of the Cuban people, the Indian element was entirely
lacking. The many names ending in two vowels were a
topic for sport. Probably the worst that can be truthfully
said is that the extreme facility which he possessed in com-
posing verses enticed him to write too many.

He should not be blamed for the excesses of his imitators,
however, the most notable of whom, Juan Cristobal
Napoles Fajardo (bom 1829), "El Cuculambe" enjoyed
considerable reputation at the eastern end of Cuba. His
volume Rumores del Hormigo, 1857, piles up the Indian
names in the descriptions of their love affairs. But he was
more successful in giving literary form to the popular
poetry and songs of the people among whom he lived, in
both essential qualities of local color and truth. He ex-
celled his master Fomaris as a painter of customs and the
beauties of nature.

Miguel Teurbe de Tolon (1820-58), without being an
imitator of Fornaris, was at least stimulated by his ex-
ample to bring out in 1856 a little volume entitled Ro-
mances Cubanos in which he strove to live up to his
doctrine that the "Cuban ballad was the true road to
emancipation for our literature." Unfortunately he had
very little popular history to work on, so that his ballads
contain little that is realistic beyond the cockfights of the
countrymen and their incorrect language. His bandits are
not very attractive. On the other hand, some poems of
personal inspiration are pleasing, because he wrote from
experience. He lived an exile from Cuba for many years

CUBA 403

as secretary of the Cuban revolutionary junta in New
York. He wrote for newspapers in both Spanish and
English, so that versions of his poems exist in both lan-
guages. He even prepared a textbook for the study of
Spanish. The notes of inspiration in his poems are love for
his mother, for Emilia and for his distant native land,
whose political freedom he ardently desired.
* Among the poems of permanent value which were first
printed in the Revista de la Habana should be mentioned
La Caida de Misolonghi by Joaquin Lorenzo Luaces (1826-
67). This begins with the clarion call,

Revenge, oh Greeks! Misolonghi in ruins
To Ibrahim fell with all her brave;
Let the Moslem find within her walls
The Greek a corpse but never a slave!

The quatrain is repeated after each octave in which the
poet urges patriots to hasten to battle with the tyrants
and to shed their blood for their wives and their homes.
What is the life of a Greek.? Slow death and infamous
slavery in which he licks the chain that binds him. Such
language, since it was applied to faraway Greeks, was
permitted by the Spanish censor to appear in print; but
as Rafael Merchan remarks, the poem "has never been
Greek to the Cubans."

Luaces, having studied Greek, took for his model the
Pindaric ode. Moreover, he was willing to polish his dic-
tion till he made a good imitation. For that reason per-
haps, he lacks the spontaneity of either Heredia or Placido
but everybody is willing with Menendez y Pelayo to con-
cede him the third place in the Cuban Parnassus. In his

404 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

^symbolism, in his care for form, in his wealth of imagery,
as in the exquisite sonnet La Salida del Cafetal, he is par
excellence an artist.

Beside the odes in which he concealed his love of liberty,
under foreign names, he wrote one to Cyrus Field, 1859,
upon cornpletion of the laying of the transatlantic cable.
The language and the sentiments are as noble as his sub-
ject. Field is placed among the great heroes of mankind.
While Alexander and Caesar won their laurels by blood-
shed. Field has achieved his glory by uniting peoples of
different race. If Columbus overcame space and opened
America, if Fulton with his steamboat has hastened the
flight of time. Field has dominated both space and time.
Mankind should honor him to the utmost and his fame
should be perpetuated forever.

In imitation of Milanes' moral poems, Luaces wrote
several, the best of which is La Vida. But they do not
contribute so much to his reputation as his dramas wherein
perhaps he also followed the older poet's example. Taken
from his favorite Greek history, he wrote Aristodemo.
More in the romantic style is El Mendigo Rojo, the dram-
atization of an incident in the legend of the Scotch king
James IV. The legend held that the king was not killed
at Flodden Field but, disguised as a beggar and assisted
by his bastard son John, he wandered about his kingdom.
The situation is very similar to that in Zorrilla's drama,
Traidoff inconfeso y mdrtir. Another play, Arturo de
Osherg, as well as a long poem in three cantos of epic char-
acter on Cuba is said to have been left among Luaces'
papers. His fame however is quite secure without these.

In the year i860 there occurred an event which stirred

CUBA 405

the Cuban literary world to its depths. Cuba's most
renowned daughter, "La Avellaneda," after twenty years
of literary triumphs abroad, returned for a brief sojourn.
Dona_Gertrudis Gomez de Atellaneda^ in the words of
Enrique Pineyro, "is considered (nemine discrepante) as
the foremost of all women who have written verses in the
Castilian language." Her career, however, belongs wholly
to the literary history of Spain and, except for the en-
thusiasm and pride which it inspired, had little influence
in the island. But her admirers gave her on this occasion
a royal welcome. Her play. La Hija de las Flores, the
scene of which is laid in the Antilles, was produced in the
theater. The Liceo Habanero voted her a civic crown and
appointed to put it on her head their resident poetess, Dofia
Luisa Perez de Zambrana.

Dofia Gertrudis Gomez de Avellaneda (1814-73) left
her Cuban home in Camagiiey at the age of twenty-two
in order to accompany to Spain her mother who had
married a colonel in the Spanish army. In 1839 she pub-
lished in Cadiz her first volume of verses. Arriving in
Madrid in 1840 where her poems had already made her
known she soon became an important figure in literary
circles. Though she continued to write verses which dis-
played a union of the classic tradition with the best features
of the Byronic romanticism, she made her mark on the
Spanish theater with a succession of dramas of great merit.
More numerous were her prose tales, some of which were
long enough to be classed as novels. The first of these in
point of time, Sab, having for its chief character a mulatto
slave contained a protest against slavery. Of her poems
a few had Cuban inspiration, La Estrella de Occidente, z

406 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

sonnet expressing her farewell to Cuba, A la muerte de
Heredia, an elegy, and other Hnes which showed that her
heart always beat with love for the country of her birth.

In as great degree as she met success in literary endeavor
was she unfortunate in love. The first man with whom, to
judge from her published correspondence she fell in love,
but did not marry, proved cold and indiflPerent, perhaps
overwhelmed by her superior intelligence. Her first hus-
band lived less than a year after their marriage. Her
second husband was attacked by a political enemy and
stabbed. And it was for the purpose of seeking an improve-
ment in his health that they came to Havana in i860.
But as he died after a few months, she returned to Spain.
For her troubles she sought consolation in religion. Con-
sequently the tone of her poems is eminently religious in
spite of the passionate robustness of her lines on historical
topics. Her dramatic masterpiece, Baltasar, embodying
the well-known biblical incident of the writing on the wall
at Belshazzar's feast, and her less effective tragedy Sauly
show the same tendencies.

Poetical activity during the early sixties was fostered
by Nicolas Azcarate (1828-94). Like Del Monte he
aspired to be the patron of Cuban literature by inviting
poets to read their compositions at evening parties in his
home. And he published some of their effusions in an
elegant volume, Noches literarias en casa de Nicolas Az-
carate. Moreover, he assisted needy poets financially.
To Mendive he gave the principalship of a secondary
school which Azcarate founded at his own expense. In
Saturnino Martinez, a youthful poet, Azcarate thought
he had discovered a genius; but in spite of the magnate's

CUBA 407

assistance Martinez never became more than a weak
disciple of Fornaris.* At a later date when Azcarate*s
own fortune had considerably dwindled he still had suffi-
cient influence to launch a subscription amounting finally
to ^22,000 for the widow and children of Dr. Zambrana.

Azcarate's fortune was derived from a very successful
practice as an influential lawyer famed for his oratorical
ability. In politics he was a reformer rather than a
separatist. In 1865 discontent in Cuba becoming very
great, the Spanish minister for the colonies, Antonio
Canovas del Castillo, agreed to listen to a request for re-
forms. On this mission Azcarate went to Spain as a mem-
ber of the "Junta de Informacion" of which the veteran
J. A. Saco was also a member. Little came of these efforts
though Azcarate even founded at his own expense a news-
paper. La Voz del Sigh, to awaken public opinion in favor
of reforms in the conduct of Cuban affairs. In Cuba dis-
content continued to rise like the tide till it broke against
the bar of official indifference and became open rebellion.
Azcarate, however, maintained his attitude as a reformer
so that on his return to Havana he was unable to regain
either his popularity or his legal practice. His fortune of
over a hundred thousand dollars having been spent it was
necessary for him in his last years to earn his living as a
government clerk.

One of the forces which prepared the revolutionary out-,
break in Cuba was undoubtedly the type of education
which the future leaders were receiving in their youth at
the Colegio de El Salvador. This school was opened and
maintained by a farsighted sagacious man to whom
education was a passion, Jose de la Luz y Caballero (1800-r

4o8 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

62). Opened in 1848 for boys over twelve years of age,
the school became immensely popular among the Cubans
but not with the Spanish authorities who asserted that
the director "was preparing the boys for conspiracy and
the scaffold/* Later they termed Luz "the patriarch
of the Cuban revolution." But his pupils insisted that
"Don Pepe," as they affectionately called their principal,
never discoursed on politics. His influence had its strength
in weekly lessons on morals which he gave the boys. He
preached to them the virtue of manly energy, of firm
resistance to every form of oppression and injustice, of
self-sacrifice on the altar of duty. The Spaniards were
probably right in seeing in this teaching a symbolism not
unlike that which characterized the poems of Luaces
when he sang the patriotism of Greeks and Poles. At any
rate the leaders in the demand for independence testify
to the value of the training they received. And regarding
Luz y Caballero the Cubans declare that, "with Felix
Varela he created in philosophy a local tradition which
is one of the constituent elements of Cuban psy-
chology."

Jose de la Luz did not live to see the outbreak of the
great struggle which lasted for ten years. The signal
for the revolt, since known as "el grito de Yara," was given
at Yara in the eastern end of the island by a wealthy
planter, Carlos Manuel de Cespedes (1819-74), on Octo-
ber loth, 1868. His demands were for a recognition by
Spain of equal rights for Creoles and peninsulars, the
abolition of slavery with compensation for owners and
the grant of universal suffrage. Long before the end of the
war Cespedes was killed. In 1878 hostilities were ter-

CUBA

409

minated by a grant of general amnesty and a promise of a
large measure of reforms in an agreement called the "pacto
de Zanjon."

The poet of this revolution, one QJJthe foremost Cuban
lyrists, was Juan Clemente Zenea (1832-71). Not only
did he supply the symbolic poem suggesting the condition
of Cuba but for his active participation in affairs he was
unjustly executed. The pathetic verses written during
his imprisonment and published after his death became a
monument to his memory.

Zenea was bom in Bayamo, the son of a native Cuban
officer in the Spanish army, and Celestina Fornaris, older
sister of the poet who sang the aboriginal Siboneyes.
He was educated in that hotbed of conspiracy, the school
directed by Jose de la Luz. At seventeen he began to
write for the newspapers of Havana under the pen name
of "Adolfo de la Azucena." At twenty he emigrated in
haste because he was implicated in the publication of a
revolutionary journal which the authorities saw fit to
suppress. After arriving in New York he continued to
write seditious articles. The impetuous youth sent one of
these with his personal compliments to the Captain Gen-
eral of Cuba, "thus insulting in the person of this au-
thority the whole Spanish nation," according to the words
of the decree of the council of war in Havana which on
December 6th, 1853, condemned Zenea to death. Such
a decree had probably for its real purpose the discourage-
ment of the Cuban revolutionary junta then active in the
United States. Two years later under the terms of the
amnesty proclaimed by the new governor of Cuba, Zenea
returned to Havana. Here he began to support himself

4IO LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

by private teaching of French and EngHsh and by occa-
sional journalistic work in prose and verse.

In i860 he put forth a modest collection of his poems
in a volume with the title, Cantos de la Tarde. The open-
ing poem, Fidelia, immediately sprang into such popu-
larity that the name became almost a sobriquet of the
author. Curiosity as to whether the incidents constituted
a real love story or an allegory lent it additional interest.
A legend sprang up in Havana that "Fidelia" was a
personification of Cuba. But there exists in Zenea*s
prose writings a passage that seems to contradict such an
idea, at least in so far as it was his conscious purpose to
write an allegory. The poem served, however, as a sym-
bolic and pathetic picture of Cuba to those patriots who
chose to regard it in that light.

Very tenderly, in a manner reminiscent of De Musset,
the poem opens with a relation of the vow which the poet
and Fidelia made to love each other forever. Circum-
stances separated them and he departed to foreign lands.
Returning after ten years he found Fidelia a corpse. From
the first hint of disaster which the refrain,

Yo estoy triste y tu estas muerta!

introduces into the first love scene, the pathetic note
swells to a finale of despairing melancholy.

The other poems in the Cantos de la Tarde are written
with the same elegiac tone though not with the same per-
fection of form. As Rafael Merchan says, "they are the
echo as much of his own heart as of the distress of the
period."

In 1865 Zenea again went to New York to engage in

CUBA 411

a business enterprise. That failing, he departed foi
Mexico where he wrote for the daily papers. Hearing
in 1868 of the outbreak of the insurrection under Cespedes
the ardent patriot hastened to New York to join the liter-
ary forces of the newly proclaimed Republic of Cuba and
became an editor of La Revolucion. In 1870 the Spanish
minister was induced to make secret overtures to President
Cespedes who was then successfully maintaining his
forces against the attacks of the Spanish soldiers. Zenea
against the advice of his friends volunteered to be the
bearer of the message because he placed confidence in a
safe-conduct given him by the Spanish minister in Wash-
ington. He landed safely, visited Cespedes, and had re-
turned to the coast when he was surprised by a Spanish
patrol. Had it not been for the safe-conduct, the mes-
sages and a sum of money in gold in his possession, he
would have been immediately executed. However, he
was sent to Havana where he was placed in the fortress
la Cabana. When news of his confinement reached Madrid
an order to release him was telegraphed to the Captain
General, Conde de Valmaseda. That official, alleging
incriminating circumstances, paid no heed to the order.
Moreover, he protracted the investigations for eight
months until a crisis in the Spanish ministry occurred.
Then a hastily conducted court-martial condemned Zenea
to death. He was executed August 25, 1871. This bar-
barous deed of Valmaseda's cost Spain twenty-five thou-
sand dollars in indemnity to Zenea's widow.

In the edition of Zenea's poems which his boyhood
friend, Enrique Pineyro, brought out in New York, the
editor grouped four compositions under the heading En

412 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Dias de Esclavitud. He considered them to offer an adt
quate idea of the man, the poet, and the patriot. The
first part reveals Zenea's feehngs upon leaving Havana,
in 1865, where conditions made life unbearable. The
second part, composed of earlier poems with the title
Nocturno resembles in its pessimistic note his model De
Musset. Then comes the beautiful hymn to the ocean
which vies with, if it does not surpass, Heredia's. Zenea
emphasizes the long period of time in which no ship sailed
over the surface of the ocean and then demands why it
did not pour forth its anger and drag into its depths the
first Spanish caravels. The final section, written during
the voyage to New York, terminates with a vision of a
free Cuba when "a victorious people salutes the flag with
the single star."

After Zenea's execution there were published in Madrid
the poems which he wrote in prison. Composed to while
away the tedium of existence they form a remarkable
human document, a record of trifling events as they
affected a sensitive mind. The title of the first poem.
El 75 de enero en mi prision, refers to the anniversary of
his marriage, formerly such a happy day but now, just
as the storm overtakes the mariner sailing smoothly along,
so disaster has come upon him and his family. The place
of his confinement was open on one side to the sky so that
one day he was able to see a swallow as it flitted back and
forth. To the swallow then he committed a message to
his wife and daughter with the wish that he too might fly
northward.

His thoughts recurred so often to his daughter Piedad,
that not only did he inscribe her name in several places

CUBA 413

on the walls of his cell but he mentioned her in a majority
of these dozen poems. One day he recollects the story
books which she used to read. Another day he promises
that, if anybody will have pity on his poor orphan child,
he will come from his tomb and thank him. Again he
explains to his wife why he did not say good-bye to the
child when he left home; so he requests her to tell the
little girl that he had gone away thus for the sake of not
seeing her cry, but later he would embrace her in heaven.

His wife Zenea addresses more directly in poems which
concern the happiness of former days. One evening a ray
of moonlight straggled into his cell. He remembers
wandering with his adored and listening with her on
many similar nights to the song of the nightingale without
a presentiment of such dreadful change. Another evening
echoes of a woman's voice singing in the apartments of
the prison commander floated to his ears. He knows that
song. "Do you remember," he asks his wife, "how once
at the piano you told me in the same words the mysteries
of the soul?" Finally he bids his wife meet him in heaven.
"Do not forget me!" he cries; and he warns her that if
she fails to pray God for his soul, his ghost will return to
beseech her not to forget him but to remember him night
and day.

The ablest journalistic champion of the revolution of
1868 was Rafael Merchan (1844-1905). From an article
of his with the caption Laboremus was derived the name
"laborante" commonly applied, at first by the Spaniards,
to the Cuban revolutionaries. In Cuba a "comite labor-
ante" directed the affairs of the revolution. In the United
States a "sociedad de laborantes cubanos" was organized

414 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

in many cities. Periodicals entitled El Lahorante came
into existence in Cuba and Santo Domingo. And a defense
of the insurrectionists in the form of a novel was published
in 1872 with the title Escenas de la Revolucion de Cuba:
Los Laborantes by "H. Goodman." Its author who thus
concealed his name is unknown.

Merchan, under sentence of death by the Spanish
authorities, found refuge in New York where he edited the
journal La Revolucion in 187 1. In the same year he put
forth an important pamphlet on the situation, La Honra
de Espana en Cuba. Three years later he was invited to go
to Colombia, his father's birthplace, to act as secretary of
a railroad company. In Bogota he continued to live for
many years and became a prominent figure there in the
world of letters. His critical articles on literature, his
prose version of Longfellow's Evangeline^ and his poems
of a metaphysical character made his name widely known.
Nor did he forget his beloved Cuba, for he strove con-
stantly with his pen to influence in her favor the public
opinion of the rest of Spanish America.

In 1890 when the Cuban question was again becoming
acute even the leading Spanish review, Espana Moderna,
opened its pages to Merchants articles. His point of view
that "we make war because we desire to be independent,
not because we hate Spaniards" seemed at least reasonable
to open-minded men in Spain. When the revolution came
in 1895, Merchan wrote several pamphlets in justification
of the Cuban cause which were translated and published
in London and New York for the purpose of influencing
public opinion.

When independence was won the Cuban Republic re-

CUBA

415

membered Merchants services by sending him as her
ambassador to France and Spain in 1902. Unfortunately
his health, undermined by hard work, was unequal to the
strain and he had to come home to die after a short period.
Cuba provided his widow with a pension.

Another literary champion of the revolution was En-
rique Pineyro (1839-1911). In his school days he was
a favorite pupil of Luz y Caballero who had such faith
in his ability that he left him money by will to enable
him to pursue his studies in Europe. And it has been said
that for his complete assimilation of the spirit of that
educator Pineyro has a right to be considered as the
typical pupil, the glory of his school.

Pineyro*s reputation in the future will rest on his many
excellent essays in literary history, but as a revolutionary
his activity consisted in the practice of delivering lectures
to groups of Cuban refugees. To the Revista cubana he
contributed articles combining literary history with bi-
ography from which the reader could derive by the in-
spiration of example fresh determination and patriotic
resolve.

His most important work of this sort was a biographical
account of Jose Morales Lemus (1808-70). This man
established, 1863, in Havana a newspaper, El Siglo, which
espoused the cause of reforms in Cuba. A reform party
very soon sprung up to which the Spanish government
paid enough heed to call a conference with representative
Cubans, since known as the "junta de informacion.'*
Morales Lemus, Azcarate and the venerable Saco were
elected among others as members of the junta to speak for
the island. As nothing came of these efforts Morales

4l6 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Lemus returned to Cuba greatly disappointed. Instead
of reforms the Spanish government levied a new and heavy
income tax which increased the discontent. The con-
spiracies and uprisings in Spain itself possibly acted by
suggestion in 1868 to start the flame in Cuba. Morales
Lemus left the island to take up his residence in New York
and Washington. When the Cuban insurrectionists estab-
lished a provisional government, their president, Cespedes,
appointed Morales Lemus envoy plenipotentiary to the
new American administration of General Grant. American
public opinion was so favorably inclined toward Cuban
aspirations for independence that the House of Represent-
atives passed a resolution recognizing the Cuban rebels
as belligerents. In the summer of 1869 President Grant
appointed Daniel E. Sickles a special commissioner to
Spain to propose a plan, which Morales Lemus had had
a part in formulating, to the effect that Spain should grant
Cuba independence in return for a large indemnity to be
paid by Cuba under the guarantee of the United States.
The Spanish government, however, was able to protract
the diplomatic maneuvers until the matter fell through.
Moreover, Morales Lemus' special friend in Grant's cab-
inet, General Rawlins, Secretary of War, died in Septem-
ber. Hamilton Fish, Secretary of State, was afraid of
possible hostilities with Spain and paid no further atten-
tion to the Cuban envoy, and in June of the following
year Morales Lemus died.

The spiritual aid of such biographies as this appears to
have been great. And the short biography was Piiieyro's
specialty. In putting before the Cubans the lives of their
heroic fellow countrymen and of other persons who fought

V

CUBA 417

Spain like San Martin and Bolivar, he performed an im-i
portant service to the cause of Cuban independence.
During his later years he lived mainly in Paris and wrote
on topics connected with literary history, such as his
excellent Romanticismo en Espana. Whatever Pineyro
has written is worth reading, not only for the scholarly
care for truth and fullness of detail which he displays, but
also for the sobriety, terseness and interest of his style.

The ten years' war having been brought to an end by the
pact of Zanjon and a general amnesty declared by the
Captain General Arsenio Martinez Campos, peace pre-
vailed in Cuba. The literary production of the next few
years may be followed in the Revista de Cuba, established
by Jose Antonio Cortina in 1877 with the avowed inten-
tion of "keeping free from party quarrels and aspiring to
reflect in its pages the intellectual movement of this
island." Though Cortina was a patriot who had suflFered
imprisonment in 1869 for printing an address by Antonio
Bachiller y Morales, he rightly concluded that the time
was a period for recuperation. In his review consequently
appeared nothing which reflected on Spanish rule. As
Cortina was a man of literary good taste the influence
which he exercised on the contributors who met at evening
for the reading and discussion of prospective articles and
poems was pronounced.

The poetry at this time, as generally in the Spanish-
speaking world, was influenced by the Germanistic spirit.
In Cuba the brothers Antonio Sellen (1840-88) and Fran-
cisco Sellen (183 8- 1907) wrote a multitude of verses both
original and translations. Francisco Sellen had been sent
by the Spanish authorities to Spain as a prisoner for taking

4l8 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

part in the insurrection. He escaped from prison, however,
and found refuge for a while in Germany. When he re-
turned to America he brought with him translations of Ger-
man poets which he published as Ecos del Rin. Later he
made metrical translations of such diverse works as
Goethe's Faust, Heine's Intermezzo lirico and Byron's
GiaouTy of which the last two appeared in the Revista
Cubana. His numerous original poems evinced a love of
tropic nature with a strain of pessimism toward life which
rang true in certain patriotic lines. His greatest effort
was Hatuey, a. dramatic poem vying with Fomaris' Cantos
de Siboney in depicting aboriginal life. For a time Fran-
cisco Sellen's copiousness made him the leading Cuban
poet, but his popularity soon suffered eclipse.

The special form of poem known by the German name
of "lied," which had been introduced into Spanish liter-
ature through imitation of Heine and Gustavo Becquer,
\ appealed to Cuban poets and was successfully practiced
Iby a group of young men composed of Esteban Borrero
Echeverria, Jose Varela, Aurelio Mityans, Diego Vicente
Tejera, and Enrique J. Varona. They took full advantage
of the fact that the anecdotal character of the lied lent
itself to the presentation of stirring tales from revolution-
ary history.

Aurelio Mityans (1863-89) as a measure of precaution
concealed his identity by signing his pictures of pitiable
sufferings from Spanish outrages "El Camagueyano."
As a student of Cuban literature he had in preparation
at the time of his premature death a book which his
friends published in spite of its fragmentary condition as
Estudio sabre el movimiento cientifico y liter ario de Cuba, 1 890.

CUBA 419

Diego Vicente Tejera (i 848-1903) excelled in rendering
the tropical Cuban landscape flooded with sunlight,
suggestive of the noonday siesta in the shade of a rustic
hut. His best descriptive pieces, En la Hamaca and El
Despertar de Cuba, were written as memt)ries of home during
his campaigning in Venezuela with the /)arty in rebellion
against Guzman Blanco. His love lyrics in imitation of
Heine to the collection of which he gave the name Un
Ramo de Violetas, were printed in 1878. His original
"lieder," narratives in rhyme, were intended to inspire
sympathy for those Cubans who fought against Spanish
authority. He translated the verses of a Hungarian poet
with the title of Cuentos Madgiares because the conditions
of the Hungarian rebels described in them applied to Cuba.
In other poems, La Muerte de Pldcido, Al Ideal de la
Independencia de Cuba, La Estrella solitaria, the patriotic
appeal was more direct, and reached a climax in Esperando,
1890. In this poem beginning "Yacen alli . . ." the dead
who have already given their lives for Cuban independence
are represented as lying impatient in their graves, im-
patient to hear the echoes of a new struggle and the trium-
phant cheers of a people who have won their freedom.

At the time of the revolution of 1895 Tejera was active
among the Cuban refugees in the United States trying to
organize a socialist party. The failure of this eff^ort cut
him oflF from the group of men who led the revolution and
the reward which its success brought to men like his former
associate Enrique Jose Varona (b. 1849) vice-president of
the Cuban Republic, 191 2-16.

Enrique-Jose Varona's most important poems were
printed 1879 in a volume whose title, Paisajes cubanos, is

420 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

descriptive of the nature of the contents. The poems
range in character from the poetic narration of episodes
in the ten years' war to symbolistic lines on Cuba. Dos
Voces en la Sombra, for example, is a dialogue between the
poet and the soul of Cuba. Bajo la Capa del Cielo and
£1 Tango are filled with patriotic and nationalistic inspira-
tion. After 1880 verse writing occupied but little of his
attention. On the other hand, the name of Enrique Jose
Varona has been associated during his time with almost
every intellectual movement in Cuba.

First of all as a teacher of philosophy, interpreting the
system of Herbert Spencer to the Cuban people, he con-
tinued the intellectual tradition of Varela and Luz. Like
them he made use of his philosophical teaching to in-
culcate in his pupils a desire for freedom. When after the
death of J. A. Cortina he became the editor of the review
to which he had so often contributed he found ample
opportunity for his peculiar form of separatist propaganda.

Varona signalized his assumption of the editorship of
the review, 1885, by changing its name to Revista Cuhana.
The first number announced that it would "be merely the
continuation of the Revista de Cuba. To present a picture
as faithful as possible of the state of our culture, offering
a neutral field to all opinions in order to keep alive Cuban
sentiment against the discouragements of the present
moment, is the first of its objects." The emphasis was
laid more and more on the part of this program referring
to the keeping alive of Cuban sentiment.

Varona's method of fostering nationalistic sentiment is
well illustrated by an oration which he delivered and re-
printed in the review, on such an unsuggestive topic as

CUBA 421

El Poeta anonimo de la Polonia. To his audience the
description of Poland was a picture of suffering Cuba.
With similar purpose he printed a remarkable article,
El Bandolerismo en Cuba, attempting to prove that crime
scarcely existed among the native population of Cuba but
was confined to persons of Spanish birth. In 1891 he
published a volume entitled Articulos y Discursos which
for the character of its contents was almost the program
of a revolutionary party. Each article treated some idea
connected with the political or economic situation in Cuba.
Four years later broke out the final and successful Cuban
revolution which solved these problems in the manner
hinted by Varona, namely, by independence.

Before the actual outbreak the Revista Cuhana was
obliged to suspend publication. Its utterances became
bolder and bolder so that finally one number was seized
and suppressed by the authorities. Varona found it
advisable to seek refuge in New York. There he became
an invaluable member of the literary cohorts fighting for
Cuban independence by his editing of the journal La
Patria, by his addresses to Cuban refugees, and by rev-
olutionary tracts. One of the latter translated into
English, Cuba against Spain, was widely circulated. It was
a terrible arraignment supported by facts and figures of
the frauds and thefts committed by the Spanish bureau-
cracy in the administration of insular affairs. In addition
he showed that the system of voting introduced as a sup-
posed reform after the pact of Zanjon was such a farce
that only Spaniards or known Spanish sympathizers were
allowed to vote.

After the Spaniards withdrew from Cuba, Varona was

422 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

appointed Secretary of Public Instruction during the first
North American intervention. Then followed a period
in which he took no part in politics. This was marked
by the publication of books on philosophy made up of
lectures previously delivered and of a collection of essays
on literature, Desde mi Belvedere. At the time of the
second North American intervention he became a leader
of the conservative party and in 191 2 was elected Vice-
president of the Republic of Cuba, a fitting honor for one
who had devoted so much of his youthful energies to its
establishment.

During Varona*s editorship of the Revista Cuhana^
many writers assisted him in carrying out his policies.
One of the oldest men enlisted was Antonio Bachiller y
Morales (1812-89). He was one of those natural scholars
whose learning increases with their years, and who retain
their mental vigor to the end. Due to the universality
of his studies his published essays embrace almost every
field. He even began his career with a few verses like the
other students who came under Del Monte's influence.
As a professor in the university, however, his intellectual
interests led him away from poetry. His most important
work will always be considered the Apuntes para la His-
toria de las Letras en Cuba, which is quite as much a his-
tory of education in Cuba as of the production of litera^
ture. During the ten years' war he was obliged for his
journalistic activity to emigrate to New York. His most
valuable work there was an edition of Heredia's poems.

It was by articles on Heredia, on Placido, on Cuban
literature in general, with special emphasis on features
antagonistic to Spanish rule, that the Revista Cubana

CUBA 423

maintained its policy of cherishing a nationalistic Cuban
sentiment. As time went on its articles became more
directly political in character, such as a discussion of the
aspirations of the Cuban liberal party by F. A. Conte, a
history of the filibustering expedition of Narciso Lopez
with all its revolutionary implications by the Conde de
Pozos Dulces, the chapters from Saco's Historia de la
Esclavitud which dealt with the iniquities of the slave
trade in Cuba. Enrique Pineyro contributed a sketch of
the history of the United States during the struggles over
the slavery question and the campaign resulting in the
election of Abraham Lincoln. The review of books such
as the biographies of Felix Varela and of Jose de la Luz
by Jose Ignacio Rodriguez offered another opportunity
for the preaching of the Cuban ideal.

Books began to reinforce the revolutionary propaganda.
Almost epoch-making was A pie y descalzo, 1890, by
Ramon Roa, the record of a journey which the author
had made through the regions devastated by the military
operations of the Spaniards during the early years of the
ten years' war. As the author had been a lieutenant
colonel and adjutant secretary to Generals Ignacio Agra-
monte and Maximo Gomez he could unfold tales of desti-
tution and distress well calculated to harrow up the soul
of his readers. With the same object was written Epi-
sodios de la RevoluciSn cubana, by Manuel de la Cruz
(1861-96), and his Cromitos Cubanos, short sketches of
prominent fellow countrymen. He contributed articles
also to the Revista Cubana. Likewise Ram6n Meza wrote
articles on literature and published books. These were
novels picturing social conditions, Mi Tio el Empleado

424 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

and D. Aniceto el Tendero. To Meza we are indebted for
a sympathetic account of Julian del Casal.

Of all the contributors to the Revista Cuhana the edi-
tor's right hand man was Manuel Sanguily, most vigorous
and active. Finally, to throw off all restraint he estab-
lished just before the outbreak of the revolution of 1895,
a journal with the innocuous title, Hojas Literarias, which
during its year of existence had some of its numbers sup-
pressed, surely not merely for discourses on literature.
One of his first contributions to the Revista Cuhana was
Los Oradores de Cuba. The discussion of each man's
oratorical ability was a peg on which to hang the account
of his services for Cuba. If he wrote of Heredia's poetry,
he exalted the revolutionary ideal. From Sanguily*s
first appearance there was scarcely a number of the re-
view without something from his pen.

But all these brave words would have been fruitless
without somebody to incite men to action. This man was
Jose Marti to whose efforts more than to any other single
individual Cuban independence was due. To this object
from the age of sixteen he devoted with a fervor rarely
equaled in any cause, both his life and a gift of speech
seldom given to mortals. Whatever other title may be
conferred on him there is one uniquely his, the "Apostle"
of Cuban independence.

f Jose Marti (1853-95), was the son of an officer of ar-
tillery in the Spanish army. He attended the school of
which the poet Mendive was the principal. From him
lit is likely that Marti absorbed some of his revolutionary
ideas, just as the spectacle of his beloved teacher in prison
embittered his spirit. Marti and another pupil used

CUBA 425

daily to escort Mendive's wife to the prison on her visits
to her husband before his deportation. Marti himself
was arrested as a conspirator at the age of sixteen and
deported to Spain, but he was permitted to study law /
during his five years' sojourn. In 1873 he went to Mexico
where he married. In 1878, he returned to Cuba osten-
sibly to practice law but in reality to engage in conspiracy
which developed into the brief period of hostilities known
as the "guerra chiquita." Marti was arrested and again
deported to Spain. He escaped, however, to France,
from where by way of New York he went to Venezuela,
but by 1 88 1 he was back in New York. For the next
eight years he earned his living by work at various Spanish-
American consulates, by articles for La Nacion of Buenos
Aires and criticisms on art for the New York Sun. He
even published two little volumes of poems, one, Ismaelilloy
the out-pourings of a father's heart in joy over his son,
the other. Versos Sencillos, a collection of love lyrics. In
1889 at a banquet of Spanish Americans he made a speech
which he terminated with this peroration: "Those who #
have a country, let them honor it; those who have not, /
let them conquer one."

The press report of this speech was such that the
Spanish government protested to the Argentine Republic
against Marti's employment at her consulship. From
that hour Marti was free to devote his whole time to the
propaganda against Spain. He became the "Apostle"
preaching Cuban independence to Cubans, wherever he
could find an audience. He went to Florida to work
among the colonies of refugees in the cigar factories of
Key West and Tampa. Everywhere among the working-

426 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

men he received an enthusiastic welcome, and at his sug-
gestion the organization of revolutionary clubs went on
apace. In 1892 Marti definitely launched the "Partido
Revolucionario Cubano" with a program expressed in
writing so that its purposes could be positively known and
open to discussion. Among the more well-to-do Cubans
Marti had to overcome much opposition, which was
summed up in the sarcasm, "Mas machetes! Pobre
Cuba!"

But the enrollment of volunteers and the collections
of money and arms continued to increase. It was neces-
sary to find military leaders. He sought out the veteran
generals Cebreco, Maceo, and Maximo Gomez and se-
cured the promise of their support. Marti's description
of his visit to the latter's home in Santo Domingo where
he was comfortably living with his family on an estate
in the country is one of the finest things from his pen.
Finally on February 24, 1895, the cry of revolution was
raised in the province of Santiago. In April, Marti and
Maximo Gomez landed in Cuba. A month later Marti,
who was now considered the president of the new Cuban
republic, set out to leave the island. With a small escort
he was surprised by a detachment of Spanish soldiers,
and fell mortally wounded at the first discharge. This
occurred at a locality known as Boca de Dos Rios, on
May 19th, 1895. The work for which Marti had given
his life resulted in the emancipation of Cuba from Spanish
rule.

Martfs literary work has been published in several
volumes by his friend, Gonzalo de Quesada. It consists
mjainly of speeches and articles written for various papers.

CUBA 427

Its value lies in the remarkable qualities of his style. He
possessed the secret of contrast with the expert journal-
ist*s ability to select details with dramatic value and the
artist's eye for color and harmony. If one wishes to
know, for example, what the streets and parades in New
York were like at the time of the formal acceptance of
Bartholdi's statue of liberty, he should read Marti's ac-
count sent to La Nacion of Buenos Aires. It would lose
little in translation, for its vivid picturesqueness is based
on fact. On the other hand, the fluent rhythm of his
speeches can hardly be rendered in translation. At times
he speaks in metaphors which are difficult to follow on
account of their depth of thought. Rarely, however,
does he fall into the merely flowery eloquence which is
so characteristic of many Spanish Americans. His
tremendous earnestness and dignity are always apparent.
In these respects the introductory paragraph of his pref-
ace to Perez Bonalde's poem on Niagara ^ is a charac-
teristic gem from Marti's tongue.

The man's wonderful talent has nowhere been more
vividly described than in this statement by Diego V.
Tejera: "He who has never heard Marti in a moment of
confidential intimacy does not realize the full power of
the fascination of which human speech is capable."

Of the two movements which have aflPected the liter-
atures of all countries at the end of the nineteenth century,
the modernista development in poetry and the vogue of
the naturalistic novel Cuba took but small share on ac-
count of the absorption of her sons in political interests.
However, it must not be forgotten that in Julian die] Casal
^ See page 320.

428 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

(1863-93) she had the honor of giving to the world one of
the most important precursors of modemista verse.
His adaptation of certain exotic forms to the genius of the
Spanish language are clearly evident to the students of
the movement. Had Casal lived longer he might have
shared with Ruben Dario the latter's fame, for the admira-
tion of the two poets for each other's work and their
reciprocal influence is evident.

In the naturalistic novel Jesus Castellanos (i 879-191 2)
was just beginning to show the possibilities of Cuban life
when his career was cut short by death. In La Tierra
adentro he depicted in a series of short stories and sketches
Cuban rural life. But he reached artistic perfection in a
tale published separately from that collection, La Manigua
Sentimental. The title was taken from the Cuban name
given to the rough woodland country in eastern and
central Cuba where the last revolution was mainly fought.
Critics agree that his observations of life in that region at
that epoch are most exact. At the time of his death
Castellanos was rapidly becoming the literary leader of
Cuba. His critical articles on literature were eagerly
read. In 191 2 with the Dominican Max Henriquez Ureiia
he organized La Sociedad de Conferencias which since then
has continued to work for the furtherance of Cuban lit-
erature by means of public lectures.

Since the winning of political independence Cuba's
material prosperity has grown by leaps and bounds. There
can be no doubt that in the future Cuba will maintain her
literary fame. At present the periodicals published in the
island equal if they do not surpass in literary qualities
those of any other nation. Take, for example, the beau-

CUBA 429

tifully illustrated Figaro, long conducted by the poet
Manuel S. Pichardo; Cuba y America, whose purpose is
"the regeneration of Cuban culture," and whose editor,
Salvador Salazar, is an enthusiastic student of literature;
or the scholarly monthly Cuba Contempordnea, directed
by Carlos deVelasco, which is doing an unsurpassed service
for the study of Cuban literature. The famous organ of
the ancient society, Los Amigos del Pais, entitled La
Revista bimestre cubana, has also been revived.

The centenaries of certain beloved poets, La Avellaneda
and Milanes, have recently given opportunity to foster the
love of literature. The prize for the poem in celebration
of La Avellaneda's birth was awarded in 1914 to Dofia
Dulce Maria Borrero de Lujan who for some years has
been Cuba's reigning poetess.

Her name appeared in an anthology, Arpas cubanas,
published in 1904, which in a certain degree fixes a' date
for the regeneration of Cuban verse after the war for
independence. The poems it contained were those of
living poets whose names were too numerous to mention
here. The collection contained also two sonnets by a poet,
Enrique Hernandez Miyares (i 859-1914), whose life
covered the period of transition from colonial to free Cuba.
His first work appeared in the Revista cubana and he was
an intimate friend of Julian del Casal.

The two sonnets A un Machete and La mas Fermosa
typify the old and the new Cuba. The first, written in
1892 when the revolutionary agitation was becoming
acute, presents the poet coming by chance upon a rusty
machete, which though it had spilled Spanish blood in an
attempt at redemption, was now lying forgetful of pa-

430 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

triotism, idle and a coward. The other sonnet, La mas
Fermosa, published in 1903, has been called the most
beautiful sonnet written in Cuba. Certainly it voices the
spirit of determination so characteristic of Cuban patriots
as well as the idealization of the Cuban attitude toward
the future. j

Keep on, O knight! With lance uplifted ride,
To punish every wrong by righteous deed;
For constancy at last shall gain its meed,
And justice ever with the law abide.
Mambrino's broken helmet don with pride,
Advance undaunted on thy glorious steed.
To Sancho Panza's cautions pay no heed,
In destiny and thy right arm confide.
At Fortune's coy reserve display no fear;
For should the Cavalier of the White Moon
With arms *gainst thine in combat dare appear.
Although by adverse fate thou art overthrown.
Of Dulcinea even in death's hour swear
That she will always be the only fair.^

^ Version of Alfred Coester.

' CHAPTER XIII

SANTO DOMINGO, PUERTO RICO, CENTRAL AMERICA

Santo Domingo is the Spanish-speaking repubHc sit-
uated in the southern half of the island of which the negro
republic of Haiti, where French is spoken, is the northern
half. Mountain ranges in the interior form a natural
barrier between the two. The whole island was named by
Columbus Isla Hispaniola or Spanish Island. The ab-
original name Quisqueya supplies a poetical appellation
to a region whose unhappy history is rich in material for
poetry.

Columbus considered this island the chief discovery of
his first voyage, for there he found gold in abundance. As
the natives were of a friendly disposition he selected it as
the site of the first Spanish settlement in the New World.
But the record of the colony forms a sad page in history.
And to the present day fate has evilly treated the dwellers
in this island so blessed by nature.

In 1795 ^^^ possession of the whole island passed to the
French. In consequence an emigration of the Spanish
families set in which materially increased when the blacks
in Haiti after 1801 were ravaging the land with arson and
murder. By 1821 the Haytians were in complete control.

Then began a hard struggle by the Spanish whites to
avoid annihilation. They found a leader in Juan Pablo
Duarte (1813-73). Educated in Spain he trained the

431

432 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

people to resist negro domination and to cling to their
Spanish tongue. For this purpose he imported and dis-
tributed Spanish books. No less important was their
training in arms, for by 1844 the Spanish element suc-
ceeded in freeing themselves and in setting up the Domin-
ican Republic.

The University of Santo Domingo, founded in 1558, had
during the colonial period been instrumental in maintain-
ing in the colony a higher degree of culture than that which
existed in the other Antilles. Students from them re-
sorted to Santo Domingo. Consequently when the
emigration occurred it carried to Puerto Rico, Cuba and
Venezuela elements which assisted in raising the intellec-
tual tone in those countries. The great Cuban poet,
Heredia, and the patron of Cuban letters, Domingo del
Monte, were children of families from the unhappy isle.
The same is true of Narciso Foxa and his brother Francisco
J. Foxa, one of the first dramatic poets of Cuba. Francisco
Muiioz del Monte (1800-68), cousin of Domingo del
Monte, contributed verses to the literary movement of the
thirties in Cuba which are worthy of being remembered,
especially his elegy A la Muerte de Heredia and his interest-
ing evocation of the hot season. El Verano en la Habana.

The intellectual leader of the republic established in
1844 was Felix Maria del Monte (1819-99). His national
hymn remains as an echo of the bitter struggle against the
Haytians. Other poems of his likewise were inspired by
personal experience or by the course of events as his Arpa
del ProscritOy dedicated to Nicolas Ureiia de Mendoza
(1822-75). The latter in the manner of the Cuban Velez
y Herrera composed verses in description of the life of the

CENTRAL AMERICA, PUERTO RICO AND S. DOMINGO 433

guajiros of his native island. Of the same age Felix Mota
(1822-61), shot by the Spaniards among other patriots
who opposed their reoccupation of Santo Domingo, wrote
poems suggestive of Milanes.

The period of peace after 1844 was too troubled for
extensive literary production. In 1861 Dominican leaders
then in power thought to find protection from the Hay-
tians by asking Spain for re-annexation as a colony. Spain
sent a few regiments of soldiers to maintain her authority,
but in 1866 she practically abandoned the island by with-
drawing the soldiers. The Dominican Republic was re-
established, but not until 1873 did political conditions
allow settled order and progress.

Among those who returned to the island after the de-
parture of the Spaniards was Javier Angulo Guridi (18 16- X
84), a former colonel in the patriot army. During his exile
he had engaged in journalism in various countries, notably
in Venezuela, where he appears to have been strongly in-
fluenced by the group of poets finding inspiration in
Indian life. Though he had the distinction of being the
first Dominican poet to see his verses collected in a volume.
Ens ay OS poeticos, in 1843, his best poems and prose tales
treat Indian legends, as his Iguaniona which he also
arranged as a drama, in 1867.

Tales of Indian life and the relations of the natives with
the first settlers became the popular subjects of literary
art during the decade of the seventies. But interest in
literature was made possible by a remarkable movement
for education and culture in which the poetess Doiia
SalomeUrefia (1850-97), daughter of Nicolas Ureria de x^
Mendoza was a prominent figure. She began publishing

434 - LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

poems in praise of the ideals of peace and progress. A
society, Los Amigos del Pais, was founded to promote the
interests of the country along such lines, and in 1878 the
society presented to the poetess a gold medal and pub-
lished an edition of her poems. In 1880 she married
Francisco Henriquez y Carvajal (b. 1859). The same
year there came to Santo Domingo one of the remark-
able thinkers of Spanish America, Eugenio M, Hostcs,
who as principal of the Escuela Normal introduced into
the island a knowledge of modern pedagogical methods.
Writing his own texts for his classes, he performed for
Santo Domingo much the same service as Andres Bello
for Chile. Dona Salome Urefia de Henriquez aided the
movement by founding the first school for young ladies,
which she directed for many years. From this time her
poems were echoes of her home life in which vibrated the
strong feelings of wife and mother.

In the volume of her poems printed in 1878, the legend
Anacaona, on an Indian topic, showed her interest in the
popular trend in literature. Her one rival in the field of
poetry, Jose Joaquin Perez (i 845-1900), vies with the
Uruguayan Zorrilla de San Martin for the primacy of
excellence in Spanish-American literary evocation of na-
tive life. His first poem of this type, Quisqueyana, bears
the date of his return to Santo Domingo, 1874, after
years of exile in Venezuela. Of the same year was the
beautiful Vuelta al Hogary an intense cry of joy at being
again in his native land. In 1877 he published the volume
entitled Fantasias Indigenas to which Perez mainly owes
his fame. These were short narrative poems, perpetuat-»
ing the memory of the aborigines of Santo Domingo, the

CENTRAL AMERICA, PUERTO RICO AND S. DOMINGO 435

best of which were El Voto de Anacaona and Guarionex.
El Junco verde relates the impression which was produced
on Columbus and his crew by the sight of a green reed, the
first sign of land. At the same time Perez was deeply
interested in the movement for better educational facili-
ties in the island and voiced it in his poem Himno al
Progreso del Pais written in the style of Doiia Salome.
Later when the modemista manner was attracting the
young men of Spanish America, Perez showed his versa-
tility by adopting it in Americanas^ a series of poems called
forth by his sympathy for the Cubans during the rebellion

of 1895-

In prose the interest in Dominican life and history
produced Bani 0 Engracia y Antoiiita, a story full of in-
tense local color by Francisco Gregorio Billini (1844-98),
and the historical tales of Cesar Nicolas Penson (1855-
1902), entitled Cos as arte j as. Of similar inspiration was
the long historical novel Enriquillo by Manuel de Jesus
Galyan (1834-1911), published in 1882, but written a few
years before. In both the style and the interest of the
subject-matter Enriquillo is one of the very best historical
novels that have been written by a Spanish American.
It depicts the early colonial period in Hispaniola at the
termination of the administration of the governor Ovando,
and the beginning of that of Diego Colon, the Admiral's
son. The arrival of Diego Colon with his bride, Maria de
Toledo, in 1509 forms an interesting episode. The friar
Bartolome de las Casas, the famous champion of human
rights for the oppressed natives, also appears in its pages.
Their grievances and last rebellion under the young cacique
whose Christian name was Enriquillo compose much of

436 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

the narrative and make it the foremost work of Spanish-
American literary art in prose which deals with the life
of the American savages.

Of the generation of men who took active part in the
upbuilding of culture in Santo Domingo should be men-
tioned Federico Henriquez y ,,Car«ajaL(b. 1848), now
chief justice of the supreme court. Though as a journalist
in early life he wrote verses and even dramas, of which
one, La Hija del Hebreo, was produced on the stage, he
distinguished himself as a professor in the normal school
established by Hostos and in other educational institu-
tions. In Cuba, he is gratefully remembered for the
assistance which he rendered the patriots of the revolu-
tions of 1868 and 1895. After the close of the ten years'
war, Maximo Gomez and other Cuban leaders found
refuge in Santo Domingo. And during his propaganda
in favor of a fresh attempt at independence, Jose Marti
received hearty assistance there. Among Martfs writings
there is no more glowing page than that which describes
his visit to Maximo Gomez in Santo Domingo in 1893,
and his welcome by various Dominicans. From there
also with their assistance Marti and Gomez set out for
Cuba to raise the cry at Baira that precipitated Cuba's
final and successful revolution. Marti's letter to Federico
Henriquez y Carvajal, dated Montecristy, March, 1895,
on the eve of his departure, has been called his "political
testament."

Of the fruits of the educational movement in Santo
Domingo, the literary activity of her sons and daughters
since the beginning of the new century give ample testi-
mony. Of the older generation Emilio Prud'homme is

CENTRAL AMERICA, PUERTO RICO AND S. DOMINGO 437

distinguished for his national anthem adopted in 1897.
In prose, Federico Garcia Godoy has long been a leading
literary critic, while his historical novels Rufinito, Alma
Dominicana, and the recent Guanuma, 191 5, give realistic
pictures of the Dominican struggles for independence.
The author's purpose in his writings has been to awaken
a strong feeling of nationality. Guanuma, the name of
the locality where the soldiers camped, is in the words of
the author, "a synthetic name which sums up the second
part of the campaign which put an end to the annexation
by the withdrawal of the Spanish troops from Dominican
) territory once more independent through the tenacity and
heroism of her sons."

Of a younger generation were the poets Gaston F. De-
ligne (1861-1913), Rafael A. Deligne (1863-1902), and
Arturo Pellerano Castro (b. 1865), whose elegant verses
deserve to be more widely known. As a writer of prose
Americo Lugo (b. 1871) has attracted attention by
his articles on sociological and critical topics and fan-
tastic tales, some of which have been collected in the
volume entitled A Punto largo.

To the modemista movement, Santo Domingo con-
tributed Fabio Fiallo (b. 1865), who has made himself
widely known in Spanish America for his tales in both
prose and verse. Tulio M. Cestero (b. 1877) was at first
one of the most extravagant modemistas, but his writings
now found in La Revista de America and other reviews
show a considerable modification of his early style.
Manuel F. Cestero has also produced excellent work as a
journalist and writer of tales.

The educational work so diligently fostered by Dona

438 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Salome Urena de Henriquez has done marvels for culture
in Santo Domingo. Through her sons, Pedro Henriquez
Ureiia (b. 1884), and Max Henriquez Urena (b. 1885),
she has enriched the intellectual life of Spanish America.
The scene of Max Henriquez Urena's activity has been
Cuba where in company with Jesus Castellanos he founded
the Sociedad de Conferencias. His lectures before that
society and his many articles on literary topics have
greatly furthered the knowledge of literary history. His
recent volume of poems, Anforas, testifies to his inherited
ability in writing pleasing and musical verses.

Pedro _Henriquez_JU[rena's sphere has been even wider.
His tragic poem in classical style, El Nacimiento de
Dionisos, evoked great praise from the Uruguayan critic
Rodo. His studies in Greek literature led him to make
a Spanish translation of some of Walter Pater's essays,
published as Estudios griegos. As professor of literature
in the University of Mexico, he wrote many useful and
interesting articles. The most brilliant of these was a
lecture in which he set forth his discovery that the great
Spanish dramatist, Juan Ruiz de Alarcon, was brought up
in Mexico where his works show he first learned the ele-
ments of dramatic art. Other essays have appeared in
the volume Horas de E studio. For the history of Domini-
can literature he has done greater service than anyone
both in his essays and the historical sketch preceding the
Antologia dominicana and in his study Romances en
Americay in which he collected the traditional Spanish
romances still sung or recited by the people in Santo
Domingo.

\,

CENTRAL AMERICA, PUERTO RICO AND S. DOMINGO 439
PUERTO RICO

The small island of Puerto Rico owing to its freedom
from political disturbances shows a different type of
literary production from that of other more agitated com-
munities. In colonial times it had the distinction of
sharing with Mexico the fame of Bernardo de Balbuena.
While bishop of Puerto Rico he composed his heroic
poem Bernardo. When he died, he bequeathed to the
church his books and papers, which unfortunately were
destroyed in the raid by the Hollanders in 1625.

In the nineteenth century the first literary fruitage was
lie to the influence of the activity in the circle of Domingo
del Monte. He personally encouraged several poets
who came in contact with him in Cuba. In 1843 was
printed in the form of a gift-book for ladies, the Aguinaldo
Puerto-Riqueno, a collection of poems by natives of the
island. A second and more famous collection of similar
character was the Cancionero de Borinquen, 1846, which
thus made use of the poetic aboriginal name of the island.

In this book the best poem and one which has lived in
popular memory is entitled Insomnio by Santiago Vidarte
(1828-48). Beginning with a barcarole it sings the tropical
beauty of Puerto Rico as seen at dawn from the sea.

A contributor to both collections was Alejandrina
Benitez (18 19- ? ). For years she was a frequent con-
tributor to the periodicals of verses with a virile tone like
her lines A Cuba and El Cable submarino. She made
a romantic marriage with the poet Arce Gautier, and their
son, Jose Gautier Benitez (1848-80), became one of the
best poets who have written in Puerto Rico.

440 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

The interest in country people and their customs popu-
larized in Cuba by Del Monte, Velez Herrera and other
poets had its echo in the prose sketches of Manuel A.
xf Alonso (1823-?), which he published under the title of
El Gibaro, the name given to the white country people
of Puerto Rico. These valuable contributions to folk
lore were written from his intimate knowledge of the
peasants and their peculiar dialect, a mixture of popular
Andalusian, old Castilian, and various aboriginal words.

A native of Puerto Rico connected with the Cuban

group about Milanes who sought to put poetry out to

^ social service was Narciso de Foxa. His poems were

partly descriptive, partly allegorical. His most ambitious

effort was a Canto epico sohre el Descubrimiento de America.

Alejandro Tapia (1827-82), who as a youth Hkewise
found encouragement from Domingo del Monte, was
the most prolific writer yet produced by Puerto Rico.
Beginning with researches into the history of the island,
he passed to the writing of historical dramas and novels
and finally composed a pseudo-epic poem of great length.
Living in Havana in 1862 he printed a volume. El Bardo
de Guamaniy containing his first productions, various
lyrics, a prose tale, La Antigua Sirena, and the dramas,
Bernardo de Palissy and Roberto d'Evreux. The latter in
representing Queen Elizabeth of England contains a
notable monologue by her before she signs the death
warrant of Mary Stuart. After the publication of this
volume Tapia returned to Puerto Rico. There he wrote
and staged several dramas, CamoenSy 1868, Vasco Nunez
de Balboa, 1873, and others.

Tapia then turned his attention to narrative, producing

CENTRAL AMERICA, PUERTO RICO AND S. DOMINGO 441

Cofresi in 1876, a tale dealing with the legendary history
of Puerto Rico; and Postumo el Transmigradoy the imag-
inary story of a man whose soul transmigrated into the
body of his enemy. Later Tapia wrote in the same
vein Postumo Envirgenado, which related the adventures
of a man in the body of a woman. The spiritualistic
leanings which led Tapia to interest himself in this sort
of tale induced him to spend energy for sixteen years in
composing La Sataniada in thirty cantos.

The extravagant prolixity of this poem, a curious com-
pound of science and religion, attempts an explanation of
the universe according to the fundamental notion that
this world is hell, ruled by Satan. Poets are apostles to
lead the human race to a superior development here and
hereafter. The author expected his poem would take rank
as the fourth epic of universal literature after the Iliad,
the Divina Comedia, and Faust.

Of more real value than his literary work perhaps was
Tapia's influence on his compatriots for he showed them
the way to better education and better literary tastes.
He died suddenly at a public meeting when explaining a
plan for the education of poor children.

Certain journalists and publicists have greatly contrib-
uted by their writings to determining the intellectual
movement in Puerto Rico. Roman Baldorioty de Castro
(1822- .? ), was the most popular of his countrymen on
account of his efforts to obtain better political conditions
from the Spaniards. As a deputy for Puerto Rico in the
Spanish Cortes Constituyentes of 1869, he strove for the
abolition of slavery and attracted considerable attention
by his 'able speeches. In 1874, political reaction com-

442 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

pelled him to emigrate to Santo Domingo where he taught
at the University. At the moment Santo Domingo was
enjoying a renaissance of culture, and was glad to welcome
him as well as his compatriot, E. M. Hostos. When Bal-
dorioty was permitted to return home, he spent his time
expounding in the papers his liberal views urging political
autonomy for Puerto Rico and become president of a
society working for that end.

^ Manuel Corchado (1840-84) was another publicist
who strove for improvements in conditions in his native
island. To further the efforts for the abolition of slavery,
he wrote a Biografia de Lincoln. He was famous as an
orator and put his talents at the service of his compatriots
as a deputy to the Spanish Cortes. He wrote poems also,
chiefly of the civic type.

yC Eugenio Maria de Hostos (1839-1903), belongs not only
to Puerto Rico but to Santo Domingo and Chile, which
countries profited by his remarkable intellect. But the
course of his life was determined by his patriotic love of
his country. He was established in Spain as a young
lawyer in 1868, when the stand which he took in arguing
with the government for reforms in Puerto Rico resulted
in his banishment. He went first to the United States
where he worked with the Cuban revolutionary junta.
The ideal which he consistently urged all his life was the
political union of all the Antilles. Leaving the United
States he traveled over Spanish America. In 1880 he
was invited to Santo Domingo, where he performed the
most important labor of his career in organizing along
modem lines the schools of that land. After nine years
of labor he was expelled by the reactionary dictator

CENTRAL AMERICA, PUERTO RICO AND S. DOMINGO 443

Heureaux. Chile then offered him a professorship in her
national university. As professor of international law he
composed a textbook on the subject which is held in high
esteem throHghout Latin America. In 1898 he tried to
organize a league of patriots against the domination of
the United States in Puerto Rico and to carry out his
scheme for a union of the Antilles.

Poets who flourished in Puerto Rico before the mod-
emista movement were Gautier Benitez, Francisco Al-
varez, a becquerista adherent, and D. F. J. Amy who
^^anslated many poems by North Americans. The
poetess, Dona Lola Rodriguez de Tio, whose first volume,
Mis Cantares, was published in 1876, achieved her greatest
successes in Cuba where for many years she was a favorite
at literary gatherings. In the words of a Cuban, "Her
poetry is herself, nobility, sentiment, uprightness, love of
home, friendship." She still contributes occasionally
to the periodicals.

Manuel Fernandez Juncos (bom 1846) took upon him-
self the task of preserving the literary history of Puerto
Rico. Beside writing articles on its customs he prepared
a valuable anthology of its writers.

CENTRAL AMERICA

During the colonial period Central America, now di-
vided into the five republics, Guatemala, Honduras, EI
Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa Rica, was politically
organized, together with the adjoining Mexican state of
Chiapas, into the captaincy general of Guatemala. When
Mexico won its independence of Spain the whole territory

444 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

temporarily became a part of that country, but in 1823 the
five provinces estabhshed themselves as the Republic of
the United States of Central America. But after fifteen
years of union internal dissensions broke up the con-
federation into its component parts which despite various
attempts at reunion have remained independent republics.

Of the total population approximating five million
about two-fifths dwell in Guatemala, one-fifth in the
densely inhabited and mountainous El Salvador. The
majority of the people are of mixed Spanish and Indian
blood, for the native races have been well absorbed. Never-
theless, regions exist where the Indians remain the same
primitive savages as their ancestors were at the time of
the first Spanish conquests of Cortes and Pedro de Al-
varado. In Costa Rica, visited by Columbus on his third
voyage and subjugated by Pedrarias de Avila from Panama
in 15 13, the population of three hundred and fifty thousand
contains a much larger percentage of unmixed Spanish
blood than that of the other states.

Apart from the numerous revolutions and almost in-
cessant fighting in these republics, the most discussed
incident in their recent history was the attempt by the
North American filibuster, William Walker, to carve out
new slave territory to be added to our southern states.
Temporarily successful in Nicaragua in 1856, he was. cap-
tured and shot during an expedition in i860 into Honduras.

During the colonial period there was produced in the
monastic establishments of Guatemala a considerable
bulk of writing mainly in Latin. In that language was
written by Rafael Landivar (1731-93), a member of a
religious order in Guatemala, a poem Rusticatio mexicana

CENTRAL AMERICA, PUERTO RICO AND S. DOMINGO 445

which critics have universally praised for its high literary
merit. Having for its topic the beauties and wonders of
America it belongs to that Virgilian type of descriptive
poetry so common to American literature. The poem has
attracted many translators, and especially to be praised
is the Spanish version of the Mexican Joaquin Arcadio
Pagaza.

Natives of Central America who have attained literary
fame achieved it often out of their own country where the
opportunity for development was too restricted. The
most notable instance is that of the leader of the modem-
ista movement throughout America, Ruben Pario, who
was bom in Nicaragua, and exercised his poetical gifts
in Buenos Aires. Yet the Central American aboriginal
strain in his blood so evident in his portrait tinges also
his writings.

A native of Guatemala whose life was likewise chiefly
spent away from his native land was Antonio Jose de
Irisarri (i 786-1 868). Inheriting immense wealth from
his father, he was obliged to go to Peru for the purpose
of looking after his property. Moreover, he had relatives
there and in Chile among the wealthiest and most in-
fluential families. Espousing the cause of the revolution,
he held prominent offices in both the military and civil
establishments. Obliged by the success of the Spanish
arms in 18 14 to leave Chile he went to Europe by way of
Buenos Aires. When Chile won her independence in 1818
Irisarri was appointed as her diplomatic representative
in Paris and London in which capacity he remained till
1825. His principal achievement was the obtaining for
Chile of a loan on more favorable terms than those usually

446 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

granted to the American republics. From Europe he re-
turned to Guatemala in time to take part in one of the
internal quarrels of the new republic. Though general
of an army he was captured and remained a prisoner for
nine months till he was allowed to escape and betake him-
self again to Chile. Again he occupied various public
offices. In 1837 he was appointed Chilean minister in
Lima. A year later he removed to Ecuador and lived there
till 1845. Thence by way of Colombia, Venezuela, Cura-
sao, Jamaica, Cuba he came to New York, arriving in
1849. In 1855 he was made the diplomatic representative
of Guatemala in the United States.

Wherever Irisarri resided his pen was diligently em-
ployed and his means permitted him to found periodicals
for the publication of its products. One of these period-
icals most worthy of mention is El Censor americano,
printed in 1820 in London. To it Andres Bello contributed
and possibly took therefrom the idea of the reviews which
he himself edited. The character of Irisarri^s writings was
as diverse as the requirements of his numerous journals.
Many of his political polemics were also printed in pam-
phlet form. His productions in verse he collected in the
volume entitled Poesias satiricas y burlescasy while his
articles on grammar and philology of which he was ex-
cessively fond he republished in Cuestiones filogicas.
V To another native of Guatemala, Jose de Batres y

Montufar (1809-44), the Spanish critic Menendez y Pelayo
accords the highest praise. He ranks him with the best
poets of America, though the Guatemalan's principal work,
Tradiciones de Guatemala^ consisting of three merry tales
in verse, belongs to a minor genre. The title is somewhat

CENTRAL AMERICA, PUERTO RICO AND S. DOMINGO 447

misleading because the stories are three bits of scandal
which might be localized anywhere. But they are related
without offensive details, gracefully, and with merry
humor. Moreover, they abound in local color when the
author describes the procession on St. Cecelia's day or
caricatures the old hidalgo, Pascual del Pescon. The
author pretended merely to translate in royal octaves the
tales of the Italian poet Casti but his work is original.
He imitated Byron to the extent of making, like his Don
Juan, skeptical and misanthropic digressions from the
Inarrative. Altogether Batres y Montufar, according to
the Spanish critic, is the "most finished model of jocose
narrative."

The romantic movement awakened echoes in Central
America. By his Tardes de Abril the Guatemalan Juan
Dieguez (1813-66) became a most popular poet and his
brilliant evocations of nature are known to all his country-
men. His Oda a la Independencia fills their special need
for an expression of patriotism, while La Garza, written in
exile, voices feelings experienced by many fellow country-
men.

The most prolific writer in Guatemala was Jose Milla X*
(1822-82), "Salome Gil," who long held the position of
editor of the Gaceta Oficial. He busied himself with the
study of history and not only wrote a Historia de Guatemala
but gave forth the results of his studies in many historical
novels. One of the earliest, Don Bonifacio, written in
verse, novelizes an episode which occurred in 1731. His
prose novels contain realistic pictures of life in Guatemala.

During the years from 1854 to i860 a Spaniard, Fran-
cisco Velarde, directed a school in Guatemala which ex- yC

X

448 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

ercised a considerable influence on the young men who
attended it. Velarde was a romantic poet whose Melodias
TomdnticaSy and Cdnticos del Nuevo Mundo belong to the
school of Zorrilla. The author being personally known
these poems have been much imitated in America.
Through him the Indian legend became popular.

In the republic of El Salvador there have lived several
poets worthy of mention. Juan Jose Bemal wrote in a
X mystic vein with a feeling for nature. Juan Jose Caiias
(1826-00) possessed a sentimental and patriotic note. At
the time of the gold fever in California he visited the mines
there but without material success. Later he fought
against the filibustering expedition of William Walker.
Then he was sent on a diplomatic mission to Chile. All
these experiences were recorded in his poems. Fond of
the ocean his best poems recall his voyages, especially
the patriotic lines A. J. M. Dow, capitdn del vapor Guate-
mala and the sentimental Se va el vapor, long a favorite
song in Costa Rica.
^^ ^saac Ruiz Araujo (1850-81) and Francisco^JE^^Qalindo^
(1850-00) compete with each other for the place of premier
poet of Salvador. Their themes were love, natural scenery
and patriotism. The latter also wrote a play in three
acts, Dos Flores, with a patriotic plot^

Joaquin Aragon (b. 1863) was a diligent versifier of
national legends some of which were lengthy. Milta,
for example, was the story of an Indian maid by that
name who fell in love with a young officer in the first
Spanish army that came to Cuscatlan (such was the na-
tive name for the country) under the leadership of Pedro
de Alvarado. The young man for love of her refuses to

CENTRAL AMERICA, PUERTO RICO AND S. DOMINGO 449

obey the orders of his superiors. Soon thereafter the
woman was ordered by the cacique of her village to kill
the Spaniard. As the command was said to be from
God, she obeyed but promptly killed herself. When the
Spanish soldiers, coming to arrest the deserter, found
that he has been murdered, they slaughtered the whole
village.

The semi-official anthologies of the Central American
states make a brave showing of poets in the matter of
number, but a reading of their productions does not im-
press one with great merit. In Costa Rica the becquerista
manner, had a considerable following. Emilio Pacheco,
Carlos Gagini, and Rafael Machado were the most pro-
lific. When the modemista movement attracted atten-
tion there arose in that state a poet, Aquileo J. Echeverria,
who deserves wider recognition for his criollo romances.

To Nicaragua abundance of literary honor has been
conferred by having been the birthplace of Ruben Dario.
Also bom in Nicaragua was Santiago Argiiello whose
verses in the modemista manner have attracted favorable
attention in other countries where he has lived.

CHAPTER XIV

THE MODERNISTA MOVEMENT

The year 18&8 may be adopted to make a date for the
most recent movement in Spanish-American literature.
In that year Ruben Dario (1867-1916), published in
Valparaiso a volume of prose and verse entitled Azul^
instantly received with acclaim by the young men. The
peculiar qualities of these poems were not wholly Dario's
invention though their excellency of execution displayed
the high quality of his poetic gifts. From Mexico, from
Cuba, from Colombia, from every country where men
were writing the Spanish language, this talented poet
absorbed tendencies and methods and welded them into
a product of his own. In Buenos Aires, a group of ardent
admirers became imitators of the new style. To provide
an outlet for their productions they founded a periodical,
an example which was followed by young men in other
countries who proclaimed themselves adherents of the
new school.

The modemista idea consisted in an adaptation to the
Spanish language of the form and substance of the French
Parnassian, decadent and symbolist schools of verse.
Beginning with translation and imitation the Spanish
Americans progressed till the content of the poems was
largely derived from American sources. In poetic forms
and meters they effected a revolution whose influence

4SO

THE MODERNISTA MOVEMENT 451

spread to Spain itself. The poets consciously sought to
widen the horizon of poetic endeavor by rejecting the
tyranny of ancient rules of prosody. Their cult of beauty
led them to evocations of ancient Greece and their love
of elegance to the Versailles of the eighteenth century.
In reaction against the excesses of the naturalistic school,
they believed that art had a mission as a creator of beauty
to cover, as it were with a veil, the brutality of human
life. In rebellion against the narrowing influences of
regionalism they hoped to find a common basis for their
literary art in the theory that their civilization was
European. The later poets have rejected this theory and
built on a universal Americanism which finds its bond
of union in a common language and a similar racial
origin.

That a type of literature so artificial in its leading
characteristics should meet with such wide acceptance
proves that it corresponded to the needs and desires of
Spanish Americans. Their various countries were pass-
ing through a feverish stage of material development
which to men of artistic temperament offered little that
was stimulating. For that reason they looked abroad.
Momentarily the Teutonic spirit as revealed to them in
Becquer*s poems and the translations from Heine made
by Perez Bonalde and the Cubans Antonio and Francisco
Sellen made a strong appeal. But the love of the exotic,
so strong in all modernista poets, was better satisfied by
the work of the French poets. Verlaine was the favorite,
but there was scarcely one of them who has not had his
followers.

Though Ruben Dario was the master, his precursors

y

452 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

in America were not without influence on his work. Fnre-
most in point of time was the Mexican Gutierrez Najera
wRcTstrove to adapt to the SpantslT language some of
the musical qualities of the French. To his efforts may
be traced the modernista demand that speech should be
endowed with the emotional power of music. Keenly
sensitrve^o music he gave a poetical interpretation to a
favorite composition in his poem La Serenata de Schuberiy
of which he says "so would my soul speak if it could."
His masterpiece in imparting to words the suggestive
quality of music was his last poem, J la Corregidoray
written for recitation at the laying of the cornerstone of a
monument to a lady. The poet bids the attentive ear
listen to the opening of the buds in the spring, to the
murmuring waters and the singing of the birds; the whole
earth is hymning the psalm of life to the lady and offering
incense at her altar. The novelty is not in the ideas, but
in the method whereby the poet succeeds in conveying
them as much by the sheer flow of verbal sound as by the
meaning of his words.

Another poet, also a Mexican, to whom Ruben Dario
owed something was Salvador Diaz Miron. The latter
put a personal stamp not only on the energetic handling
of his personal or social themes, but also on a certain
meter, the hendecasyllabic quatrain. This meter, though
not widely used in Spain, was popular in Spanish America
for religious and love poetry. Diaz Miron adapted it to
heroic themes, in which form it was widely imitated and
became associated with his name. Ruben Dario in Azul
paid him the compliment of a sonnet which gave a just
characterization of Diaz Miron's verses as follows:

THE MODERNISTA MOVEMENT 453

Your quatrain is a four yoked chariot drawn by wild eagles
who love the tempests and the oceans. Heavy brands and stone
clubs are the proper weapons for your hands. Your mind has
craters and ejects lavas. Your rude strophes, never slaves,
travel over the mountains and plains of art like a herd of Amer-
ican buffaloes. What sounds from your lyre sounds far, as
when Boreas speaks or the thunder. Son of the new world, let
humanity hear the pomp of your lyric hymns which triumphantly
salute liberty.

It is a tribute to Dario*s versatility that he could draw
inspiration from this fire-eater when his own habit of
mind, loving elegance' and beauty, was so different. It
was easy on the other hand for him to find suggestions
in the work of a Cuban poet, Julian del Casal, who was
living in a world of his own creation, a bit of Japan set
down in Havana.

Julian del CasaI^(i863-93), completely imbued with the
spirit of French_£oetry, not only composed his verses in
the same manner but arranged his daily life in keeping
with its suggestions. For a poetic canon he adopted the
epistle which accompanies the- second volume of Jean
MoresLS^ Les Cantilenes. His living-room he furnished in
Japan'SsFstyle so minutely, that he even kept joss sticks
scented with sandal wood burning before an image of
Buddha. This love of Oriental elegance appears in his
poems, notably Kakemono in which he describes to the
last detail of color and outline the toilet of a geisha, the
make-up of her face, the arrangement of her hair and the
embroidery of her silken clothing. Parisian elegance
had no less a fascination for his mind. As, however, he
had never been in Paris, that world was equally an im-
aginary one, as exotic as the ancient Greek world whose

454 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

beauty he loved. Thepessimism of Baudelaire and Ban-
ville likewise appealed to his nature. They scarcely sur-
passed Casal in his expressions of discontent at the uni-
verse, or of horror at early death which in point of fact
he did meet.

The souget^practiced with such perfection by Leconte
de ITsle and J. M. de Heredia was CasaFs favorite form
of verse. Like them he drew vivid pictures whose care-
lully chosen details leave a strong impression on the
reader's mind. His portraits of individuals, Prometheus,
Salome, Helen of Troy are unique. The sonnet on the
latter, for example, is a gem of great beauty. The first
quatrain refers to the heaps of the slain, the second draws
attention to the smoking ruins of Ilion, the tercets reveal
Helen "wrapped in a vestment of opaline gauze spangled
with gold" as "she gazes indifferent at the murky horizon,
toying with a lily in her rosy fingers." With equal skill
Casal depicted persons of the actual world about him in
Havana; the barefoot friar begging for alms whose mind
is distracted between the call to mass from the convent
bell and the braying of his ass; the maja, clad in a gaily
embroidered Manila shawl, whose little slippers, as she
dances, dart back and forth beneath her skirt of black
lace and green satin "like timid doves in the foliage."

Though Casal lived in an artificial world of his own
creation he took an interest in the troubled politics which
was agitating Havana and his friends who were writing
like himself for La Habana Elegante, He wrote not only a
few poems on certain abhorred acts of the government but
also contributed prose sketches on Havana society. One
of the latter containing piquant references to the governor

THE MODERNISTA MOVEMENT 455

and his family brought the police to the office of the
periodical. Among his essays in prose should be men-
tioned a study of Joris Karl Huysmans whose work Casal
greatly admired. Some of his articles in prose were
collected in the volume entitled Bustos y Rimas, published
in 1893. His earlier poems were printed in Hojas al
VientOy 1890, and NievCy 1891.

The dates of these collections would show that Casal
was merely contemporary with Ruben Dario, but as
CasaFs poems began to appear in periodicals in the middle
eighties there can be no doubt that Dario was conversant
with them. And if Casal was not an actual precursor of
Dario it is certain that the latter*s verses in Prosas Prof anas
show in a more marked degree than in his Azul that love 1
of the exotic, that delight in color and that sensual joy
in the refinements of elegance which Casal displayed from
the first. 5^oreover, Dario passed several weeks in Havana
in intiniate acquaintance with Casal. They wrote poems
in collaboration from which it is impossible for the critic
to separate their respective compositions. And in Paginal
de Vida Casal, without mentioning Dario's name, described
the visitation of a poet who strove to move him from his
pessimism.

Another contemporary whose metrical experiments
taught Dario something was the Colombian Jose. Asuncion ){
SilyaJ^i 860-96), truly a poet of the first rank. Alva's
verses possess the charm of strong personal feeling set
forth sincerely in musical language. Ihough^essimistic
in ton^ there is no pose about them and at times the joy
of living shines through the gloom of disillusion. If ever
a man has been harassed by bad fortune it was Silva. Of

456 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

aristocratic lineage he was bom handsome and wealthy.
But he suffered one blow of fortune after another. His
family inheritance was swept away by a revolution in
Colombia. His father dying it devolved on the son not
only to support the family but to attempt to recover some
part of the lost property. In this he was unsuccessful.
The manuscript of a literary work of which he had high
hopes was lost at sea during transmission to France for
publication. His verses, his chief solace in evil days, were
not printed in collected form till after his death. Finally
a beautiful sister of whom he was very fond was claimed
by death. So he could think of no relief for his ills but the
taking of his own life by a pistol shot.

The obggssJQn of death and the pessimistic attitude of
one whose joy in living is almost childlike are the striking
characteristics of Silva's mentality. Childhood memories
frequently recur to him. In the musical poem Crepusculo
he retells the fairy stories which delighted his babyhood
days and crowd into his mind as he listens to the grand-
mother singing a child to sleep.

The most widely known of Silva*s poems are Los Noc-
turngSi^onsistmg of the brief relation of four love scenes
with a tragic note. Metrically these display Silva's
originality in the handling of long and short lines in an
attempt to adjust the rhythm of the verse to the inward
rhythm of the thought. One of his methods was the
repetition of words or lines assisted by the mode of print-
ing. He sought, for example, to evoke the shadows of the
lovers in the moonlight thus:

Y tu sombra
fina y languida

THE MODERNISTA MOVEMENT 457

y mi sombra,
por los rayos de la luna proyectadas,

sobre las arenas tristes < ^

de la senda se juntaban, / >^
y eran una, <i>-)

y eran una, /%i*

y eran una sola sombra larga, ^^
y eran una sola sombra larga,
y eran una sola sombra larga.

One of Silva's finest poems is Ante la Estatua, referring
to the famous statue of Bolivar in the public square of
Bogota. Its pessimistic purpose of pointing out the
pettiness of mankind is again characteristic. The poet's
attention is drawn to the bronze figure because he sees
two boys playing in front of the statue. As he meditates
he hears a voice speak of the hero in a depreciative manner.
Tales of colonfal times occur to the poet*s memory, and
the form of the Liberator rises before his eyes, who dis-
courses at length on the hours of bitterness falling to his
lot in his last years at the hands of the peoples for whom
he had labored.

Silva*s metrical mannerisms when imitated by others
degenerated. He was as inimitable as Edgar Allen Poe
whom Silva greatly admired, and whose rendering of the
sound of bells he tried to rival in Spanish in El Dia de
Difuntos, In fact Poe was a favorite not only with Silva
but with other modernista poets. The references to Poe
in their works, as well as to Walt Whitman are numerous.
With the latter in fact they seem to feel a certain affinity.
Ruben Dario often calls on the name of Walt Whitman as
the one singer of the New World who tried to be truly
American.

458 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

It is a tribute to Ruben Dario's talent that he could

gather ideas from so many diverse sources arid make them

/into his own by means of his marvelous ability for writing

' verses. He was like a bee that could make honey from

many flowers. His life too was that of the wanderer. Bom

in Nicaragua, he emigrated to the west coast of South

America and thence to Buenos Aires. While in Chile he

made his first great literary success by the publication of

\ \\ Azul. This book was partly in prose and partly in verse.

It is a mark of Dario's unusual ability that an account of

his career must consider both his prose and his verse.

The prose compositions of Azul were impressionistic
pieces, almost poems in prose. Though most have the
form of tales or fairy stories, their scenes being laid in
Greece or some other land of the author's imagination,
some are mere torrents of imagery. Nearly all teach the
compelling force of the desire for the ideal, whether for
the poet the ideal is a nymph in the wood. La Ninfa, or for
the gnome the ruby. El Rubi, symbol of the reproductive
power of mother earth. Blue is the color of the ideal, like
the veil of Queen Mab, El Velo de la Reina Mab, who comes
in her car made of a single pearl to the four lean unshaven
men in the garret, the sculptor, the painter, the musician,
and the poet. Complaining bitterly of their luck, their
lamentations are turned to laughter after she has wrapped
them in her veil through which they glimpse life with a
rosy tint.

The most important pg^ms.in Azul were those which
voiced the feelings excited in the poet's mind by the four
seasons of the year. Spring of course suggests love; but
so do the others. Summer love is symbolized in the mating

THE MODERNISTA MOVEMENT 459

of Bengal tigers. That day, however, the tigress was
killed in the hunt by the Prince of Wales; wherefore the
tiger mourning in his lair dreamed of revenge, of sinking
his claws in the tender bosoms of children and maidens.
Love in the Autumn is tinged with the melancholy of the
season of dying things; nevertheless a friendly fairy
whispers secrets to the poet, what the birds are singing,
what the girls are dreaming. As for Winter, its snows
may drive men from the city streets to sit by the fire of
crackling logs, but what better music to accompany
caresses and kisses.?

The peculiarities and excellencies of Azul were pointed
out by Don Juan Valera in his famous criticism printed in
his Cartas americanas. The Spanish critic was impressed
by the Gallic quality of Dario*s style, especially of his
prose. As his language was excellent Castilian, Valera
termed Dario*s Gallicism mental rather than verbal.
Azul was a pure work_of art with the stamp of originality.
Though it showed that its autFoFwas^saturated with the
most extreme type of French literature, he imitated ,no
one writer. His adoration _of^ nature was pantheistic.
And though at times there was an exuberance of sensual
love, as in the poems on the seasons of the year, there was
something religious about that love. Though applauding
the perfection of his "mental Gallicism," Valera wished
that there occupied a larger place in Dario's art the teach-
ings of Spanish literature. As for the title of the book, or
more especially the motto from Victor Hugo, "L'art,
c'est Tazur!" it seemed to the critic merely an empty
phrase. Why is art blue rather than green, red, or yellow?

Between Azul, published in 1888, and Dario's next

4^0 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

[x) volume of poems, Pros as Prof anas ^ 1896, he took vast
strides along the road of mental Gallicism. While there
is no evidence of his following Valera's advice regarding
the study of Spanish literature, he was certainly well
read in the classics and in the poets of the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries. He even wrote poems in imitation
of the archaic and introduced archaic words into his
vocabulary. Moreover, he undoubtedly welcomed any
suggestion that came to him from the work of his con-
temporaries. In addition those eight years were full of
experience. In Buenos Aires, an enthusiastic group of
young men formed a coterie of modemista poets. In 1892
he was in Europe. In Madrid, where he represented
Nicaragua at the quadricentennial celebration of the
discovery of America, he made the acquaintance of the
Andalusian poet, Salvador Rueda. For the latter's En
Tropel Dario wrote some verses by way of prologue with
the title P&fiiQO. To these verses are commonly ascribed
the entrance into Spanish literature of the modemista
influence. In Paris he made the personal acquaintance
of many French poets as well as a rather critical study of
the works of the decadent and symbolist schools. The
articles which he contributed to periodicals on these men
were collected in Los Raros. Taken together they express
Dario's own literary ideal, art is the rare, the strange, the
unusual, so well embodied in the title for the volume of
verses which he wrote during these years, " Profane
Prose."

But to please this poet's sensibilities the strange and
rare must be conjoined with the elegant and the sump-
tuous. His artistic creed may be art for art's sake, with

THE MODERNISTA MOVEMENT 461

little concern for conventional morality, but he has no
liking for the ugly and vulgar. He is no follower of
Baudelaire. Rather his exquisite senses demand clean
beauty, fine lace, shining jewels, sweet odors, brilliant
flowers, the refinements of classic Greece or of eighteenth-
century French society. The lady of his dreams is some-
times typified by Leda, more often she is a marquise of
the old regime.

From the point of view of versification, Prosas Prof anas
contains all manner of experiments aiming at a greater
metrical freedom as well as new poetic forms. It was the
poems of this volume that gave models to other mod-
emistas. A single example of the many good pieces in
it is the favorite Sinfonia en gris mayor. The novelty of
this poem, the emphasis given to one color was probably
suggested by G^tier's Symphonie en hlanc majeure but
Dario seems to have applied also Rimbaud's conception
of vocaHc tone color. The vowel of the word "gris"
(gray), the only assonance used throughout the poem,
may be employed even in the English rendering for the
same purpose.

The sea as in a silvered glass
Reflects a sky as gray as zinc;
Afar some birds in bands, like stains,
Into the polished surface sink.

The sun, a disk opaque and round.
Slow climbs the zenith, old and sick,
The seawind rests within the shade.
Its pillow a cloud-bank gray and thick.

The waves heaving with leaden beat
Beneath the wharf their moan begin;

462 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

A sailor sitting on a coil of rope.
Puffing his pipe, is rapt in thought
Of fog-clad home and distant kin.

A wandering wolf the old seadog;
Brazilian suns have tanned his skin;
Typhoons in China, fierce and wild.
Have seen him drink his flask of gin.

His nose so red has long been known
To salt sea spray, which knows them still, i
His curly hair, his biceps huge,
His canvas cap, his blouse of drill.

Through smoke upcurling from his pipe
His foggy land the old marine
Can glimpse, from where one sultry day
Shook out her sails his barkentine.

In tropic siesta he falls asleep.
While gray on all its mark imprints.
The sky to the horizon shows
A draftsman's scale of grayish tints.

The tropic siesta: the locust old
Essays her guitar hoarse and thin; fV"
The cricket plays in monotone J^

On the single string of her violin.^ /jM^^^

The preeminent quality of the verses in Prosas Prof anas

, was grace; in his next volume of collected poems. Cantos

[^) de Vida y Esperanza, 1905, it was force. Many of these

poems had been called forth by public events. The

Spanish-American world at the turn of the century had

^ Version of Alfred Coestcr.

THE MODERNISTA MOVEMENT 463

been stirred to the depths of its soul, first by the revolu-
tion in Cuba, and second by the Spanish-American war.
Though sympathizing with Cuba the Spanish Americans
felt the call of the race against the great northern re-
public. In their Tyrtaean outcries Ruben Dario followed
rather than led.

He was essentially a poet of personal expression. Writ-
ing some verses as an introduction to the Cantos de Vida y
Esperanza, he made with engaging frankness a confession
of his past and a criticism of his literary career which
leaves only the details to be supplied by the biographer.
He referred to the ideas of his youth, his sensuality, his
love of beauty, the bitterness of disillusion, his longing for
sincerity in art; at last he feels that "the caravan sets out
for Bethlehem." It cannot be said, however, in spite of
certain poems on repentance, that Ruben Dario seriously
renounced his Epicureanism or became devout as did
Verlaine and other French poets of his acquaintance.

Metrically the new experiment in Cantos de Vida y
Esperanza was an attempt at the classic hexameter, the
meter which he selected as most worthy for his political
themes. In La Salutacion al Optimista, beginning with
the line,

Inclitas razas uberrimas, sangre de Hispania fecunda,

he not only set a new model for patriotic utterances in
verse, but he extended a greeting to Spanish Americans
urging them to lay aside their quarrels and look to the
future when the ancient Latin stock should rule a new
continent. The enemy most to be feared seemed the
"colossus of the north" which for the moment was typified

464 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

in President Roosevelt. Accordingly in an ode A Roose-
velt, Dario thus abjured the bogey of Anglo-Saxon domina-
tion.

'Tis only with the Bible or Walt Whitman's verse,

That you, the mighty hunter, are reached by other men.

You're primitive and modern, you're simple and complex,

A veritable Nimrod with aught of Washington.

You are the United States;

You are the future foe

Of free America that keeps its Indian blood,

That prays to Jesus Christ, and speaks in Spanish still.

You are a fine example of a strong and haughty race;

You're learned and you're clever; to Tolstoy you're oppose d;

And whether taming horses or slaying savage beasts,

You seem an Alexander and Nebuchadnezzar too.

As madmen to-day are wont to say.

You're a great professor of energy.

You seem to be persuaded

That life is but combustion,

That progress is eruption,

And where you send the bullet j

You bring the future.

No!
The United States are rich; they're powerful and epyit;
They join the cult of Mammon to that of Hercirfes,
And when they stir and roar, the very Andes shake. . . .

But our America, which since the ancient times

Has had its native poets; which lives on fire and light.

On perfumes and on love; our vast America,

The land of Montezuma, the Inca's mighty realm.

Of Christopher Columbus the fair America,

America the Spanish, the Roman Catholic,

O men of Saxon eyes and fierce barbaric soul.

This land still lives and dreams, and loves and stirs I

THE MODERNISTA MOVEMENT 465

Take care!
The daughter of the Sun, the Spanish land doth live!
And from the Spanish lion a thousand whelps have sprung!
*Tis need, O Roosevelt, that you be God himself . . .
Before you hold us fast in your grasping iron claws.

And though you count on all, one thing is lacking, — God!*

This popular and interesting expression of the common
Spanish-American conception of the United States was
largely repudiated by Dario in a subsequent poem Salu-
tacion al Jguila, written to welcome the North American
delegates to the Pan-American Congress held in Brazil
in 1906. In this poem he prays for the secret of the north-
^ em republic's political and material success and reminds
the Eagle that the Condor exists with his brother in the
lofty heights. Together they may achieve marvels.
Rather than write such sentiments as these a Venezuelan
critic said he would have cut off his hand.

The volume in which this poem was printed, pi Canto
trrante, 1907, contained verses of many periods grouped
to bring out the idea suggested by the title that the poet's
mission is to travel over the universe seeking beauty every-
where and express it in beautiful language, for the soul of
all things is Beauty. This pantheistic notion is a leading
characteristic of some of Dario's followers.

The modemista school in so far as it was influenced by
Ruben Dario, started with imitation of Jzul and the
verses collected in Prosas Prof anas. The establishment of
the Revista Latina by his coterie in Buenos Aires was
the signal for ambitious young men in other centers of
»VersionofE.C. Hills.

466 LITERARY HISTORY OF SPANISH AMERICA

Latin culture in America to found such periodicals as
La Revista Azul in Mexico, Cosmopolis in Caracas, and
Pluma i Ldpiz in Santiago de Chile. These periodicals
were short lived but stimulated the establishment of El
Cojo Ilustrado of Caracas and the Revista Moderna of
Mexico, both of which for more than a decade at the turn
of the century were the leading literary journals of Latin
America. In them might be read the best literature that
was being produced. No poet, however, developed the
versatility of Ruben Dario though in Buenos Aires there
were several writers with distinct personalities working
along original lines.
\/ Of these Leopoldo Diaz, bom 1862, selected the sonnet

as his favorite mode of expression and was really a Par-
nassian in the manner of the French poet, J. M. de Heredia.
The sonnets reveal a sensuous love of beauty under the
guise of Hellenism, which is not derived, however, from
a study of ancient Greece, but from Parisian poets. Fol-
lowing the trend of his contemporary Americans, Diaz
wrote one volume of sonnets devoted to the early Spaniards
in America, Los Conquistadores. In all his work Diaz'
special merit is his clever handling of the Spanish language.
In regard to it the French critic, Remy de Gourmont, in a
preface to a French translation of Las Sombras de Hellas,
coined the term "neo-espanol."

He said: "The Spanish language lives again free and
rejuvenated in the old Castilian colonies which have
become proud republics. This new literature owes little
to Spain beside the language; its ideas are European. Its
intellectual capital is Paris. ... In the purest 'new-
Spanish' Diaz sings of Greek beauty. This language

THE MODERNISTA MOVEMENT 467

more supple than the rude classic Castilian is also more
clear; the phrase constructed in the French manner pur-
sues a course more logical, more according to the natural
course of thought."

Such ideas raised a storm of protest from Spaniards,
while Spanish Americans were not quite content to agree
to all its implications. Their efforts to enrich their vo-
cabulary were by no means limited to Gallicisms, for
they studied the Spanish classics and revived many old
terms as well as adopted such aboriginal words as repre-
sented native conditions. Those members of the literary
coterie in Buenos Aires who most consciously strove
for a richer and more expressive vocabulary were Ricardo
Jaimes Freyre and Leopoldo Lugone